Huh? The Houston metro area has 7.5 million people. The New York City metro area has 20 million.
If you want to look at the city proper (not a great comparison since city boundaries are somewhat arbitrary) then it’s 2 million for Houston versus 8 million for NYC.
On the other hand, the Greater Houston Area has a similar population to NYC, yet it has 26-minute commutes versus 36 minutes for NYC.