Surely you jest. Even in Manhattan this is rarely true. Outside of Manhattan it is practically never true. In some circumstances in Manhattan the subway can indeed be faster, but it’s really only true for traveling north/south along an express line during peak traffic.
For instance I can get from 96th to Chambers in about 25 minutes on a subway if I’m lucky with my timing. That’s faster than a car during peak traffic, but slower than a car during any other time of day. But if I need to get from 96th to basically anywhere else that isn’t on the 1/2/3 there is no way the subway will ever win, much less by any significant margin.
Even the idea that subway is “much much faster” defies basic logic. If that were universally true few people would ever take a ride share or taxi.
And this ignores the almost comical problems and lack of reliability with the subway system in NYC. I cannot count the number of times I’ve had to give up, exit the subway station, and hail a cab. I imagine for many people it’s happened one too many times and they’ve exclusively switched to rideshare/taxi.
For me personally I’ve switched to electric bike. I gave up on the subway earlier this year after one too many negative encounters with vagrants and criminals. A good question to ask is how visitors feel about the NYC subway system. When friends or family come to visit, what do they think about it? I don’t know about you, but for me it’s a healthy combo of amazement at the scale of the system, and amazement at how atrocious and disgusting it’s become.