NEW YORK CITY —  Mayor Bill de Blasio told New Yorkers Thursday they don't need to buy a new car. 

“The future of New York City is less about the car,” de Blasio said. “I’m never going to own a car again.” 

De Blasio — who is chauffeured around New York City in a tax dollar-funded SUV — advised New Yorkers Thursday not to fear the subways amid the global novel coronavirus pandemic. 

"My advice to New Yorkers is, ‘Do not buy a car," de Blasio said. “Cars are the past, the future is going to be mass transit, biking, walking.” 

This advice comes as the MTA faces a $16 billion deficit and the city gears up for what former Health Commissioner Oxiris Barbot dubbed this week, “an inevitable second wave.”

“I just think cars don’t makes sense with all the other options,”  de Blasio said. 

The Mayor argued the COVID-19 crisis would end with the arrival of a vaccine, at which point New Yorkers could safely return to public transportation. 

De Blasio also noted 1.3 million New Yorkers had filed for unemployment and countless others are working from home. 

“I don’t think we’re going to see overwhelming numbers of folks on mass transit,” de Blasio said. 

This assertion came as after another reporter quizzed de Blasio about a bus line for Flushing’s Main Street that the mayor announced earlier this summer and had not yet arrived. 

“There were some very particular local concerns,” de Blasio said. “We were trying to see if we could make adjustments to address that.” 

De Blasio’s daily press briefing included a call to Washington D.C. to assist New York City tenants with rents and a condemnation of the Trump administration’s decision to move the U.S. Census deadline forward by a month. 

Only 54.8 percent of New Yorkers had completed the census as of Thursday, according to de Blasio. 

“We need to do everything we can to maximize the count,” de Blasio said. "Everyone needs to be a part of this."