Ridesharing Efficacy in NYC
I have been very quick to order rideshares when I want to go around NYC - my heuristic for doing so is trying when the destination I go requires more than 20 minutes of walking or more than 1 transfer. My philosophy was that being unencumbered by this cost would largely mitigate some frustration and enable me to jet around to wherever I want to go, and result in me being happier to stay in the city.
My last 4 years of getting around (including trips to Long Island) have been mostly done with a combination of public transportation and rideshare options (lyft, uber, etc). Rideshare has cost me about 6k over the 4 years. A monthly unlimited metrocard has cost me about 6k over the 4 years, too.
A 3k / year total expense for going wherever I want in a simple way, not having the hassle of owning a car in NYC (no need to find a parking spot / worry about alternate side parking rules / think about renting a home with a driveway or paying for a parking garage). This has made living in NYC even better than it already was, with fewer downsides.
A quick search on google reports the average cost of owning a car as somewhere between 5k and 15k a year (1, 2, 3). NYC skews a bit higher because of high parking costs (either in time - finding a free spot - or money - expensive parking garages). So it is generally cheaper to rideshare rather than own a car in NYC for me.
So it seems that if you want to have a lifestyle that a car can offer you in NYC, you might be better off opting to rideshare excessively.
Of course, this does not account for being able to have road trips or for enjoying driving a lot (which I do). Rideshare options may also become more expensive in the future, as I understand it. And walking everywhere or taking the subway everywhere that allows it is still cheaper, obviously.
And if you need to commute to work everyday to a place that does not have well-connected and reliable public transportation (or use a car for your work), you may find that having a car is the cheaper way to go.