I moved to NYC a year ago and have the same basic feeling as you. Could the subway be improved? Obviously! But New Yorkers don't realize how good they have it compared to the rest of the U.S. [0] If a train takes 10 minutes, they're annoyed. Meanwhile, scheduled headways of 20 minutes are the norm where I'm from -- on the one light rail line that goes through the center of town.
My daily experience on the NYC Subway is that it's an incredible marvel. [1]
[0] There was even an article on r/nyc earlier this year about how New York shouldn't get Amazon's HQ2 based on the access to transit requirement. The article argued that the transit is too bad here. That's -- that's so absurd as to be almost beyond belief.
[1] An enormous caveat here: I can walk or bike to work. I do use the subway at peak hours fairly frequently, but I'm not reliant on it or held hostage by it, as many others are.
My daily experience on the NYC Subway is that it's an incredible marvel. [1]
[0] There was even an article on r/nyc earlier this year about how New York shouldn't get Amazon's HQ2 based on the access to transit requirement. The article argued that the transit is too bad here. That's -- that's so absurd as to be almost beyond belief.
[1] An enormous caveat here: I can walk or bike to work. I do use the subway at peak hours fairly frequently, but I'm not reliant on it or held hostage by it, as many others are.