They might be "trying", but they're failing miserably. I'd say they aren't really even trying to make a competitor to New York City: no place in America looks remotely like it. I don't see any American city attempting to make itself dense, walkable, and with a decent subway system, except maybe DC (but that one has structural challenges because it's split across 3 states for stupid historic reasons).

I don't think California has failed in making competition for NYC in SF or LA. Yes, they aren't exactly like NYC, and they have different benefits, but they attract as much of the nation's (and world's) mindshare these days.

The biggest attraction of SF and LA is the weather.

Weather is some of it, but that isn't close to the biggest appeal of those cities at all. Many of us like SF and LA way better NYC, and NYC weather really isn't that bad (from my limited 3 month stay there).

If it's the past 3 months, those aren't the bad ones. they're a bit hot. it's the next 5 to watch out for.

they're not that bad, but they're not everyone's cup of tea.

It was summer, and it wasn't a nice one. But NYC seemed fine in terms of weather for me.

But I really didn't like the culture, the roads, the housing, the way people drove. I'm just not suited for east coast life.

DFW, Houston, Atlanta, Miami, Phoenix, There are a ton of up and coming metros that are growing 3–5% a year while NYC is in decline along with LA and Chicago.

These cities aren’t competing on crowded, dirty public transit. They’re not prioritizing “walkability” (i.e walking through human feces and crowds of homeless people). I could definitely see the population of say, the combined TX metros overtaking NYC. Heck FL recently surpassed the population of New York state for the first time in history, not many seemed to notice. They’re not competing, they’re winning.