> If the city has any ambition to be a melting pot for all, it needs to allow everyone to coexist.

Which is an excellent argument for public transport, the point of it is to serve everyone rather than those who can afford to own and run a car and those how have the ability to drive.

I can't comment to NYC public transit but there are plenty of cities around the world with reliable and effecient public transport, don't write it off completely because NYC's is subpar. The idea is not to ban cars completely but to make taking alternatives easier and better than taking a car, in doing that we need to divert some of the money and land that cars have historically dominated.