New York Times article on how fewer people are getting driver’s licenses at 16.
Those of us who didn’t get our driver’s licenses as soon as we could (like me- I didn’t get one until I was 23) were ahead of our time, and anticipating a future trend.
It doesn’t surprise me.
My daughter is 21, I actually used to teach performance driving, and I was seriously baffled when this child refused to learn to drive, and STILL refuses.
Her reasons are good ones:
- it’s scary and it’s a huge responsibility.
- It’s too expensive with the high gas and insurance rates.
- She says it’s just as easy to get around on a bus.
- Our state actually makes it quite difficult to get a license at 16, and if they do get one, it’s only good for a few hours a day, and they can’t have anyone else in the car with them. Basically it’s a seriously restricted license for almost 2 years.
I wish she’d learn to drive… but there is no way I’d force it.
My oldest son is 30, and he doesn’t have a licence.
My second oldest son, at 28, passed his test and got his licence about a month ago.
I must have done something right while raising them.
It is! I was very, very aware of that. I have generalized anxiety disorder, which is probably why I never went through the “I’m immortal and nothing bad can happen to me” phase most teenagers do. That’s good, in that I never did a lot of the risky stuff some teenagers do, but I’m sure it feels good to feel like nothing bad can happen to you… I think I still worry more about driving than most people do, even after doing it for ten years- I have nightmares every so often about getting into car accidents that are my fault.
My parents tried to force it when I was 16. It made me much more anxious about driving, which was definitely not what was needed in my case. I had many, many practice driving sessions that ended in tears, because I was so anxious.
Oh, and yelling at someone who is crying because she’s nervous- totally counterproductive. The yelling just made me more anxious.
I certainly found that to be true during my college years. I miss that car-free time in my life.
I’m still working on getting mine.
The new graduated system is supposed to make it so people get more experience driving, but I’ll be shaky still because I don’t have anyone who will take me out, my experience comes from what I got in driver’s ed and that’s it. Then it’ll be another two years before I get my full license (so mid-2010 if I manage to pass the test this summer).
Then again I look at the drivers on the roads now and I figure as long as I don’t hit someone while attempting to park or make any huge errors I may just make it.
I don’t mind the bus system, but as my son gets older and I want to do things with him I find I long for a car more and more. Makes things easier and would certainly cut my commute time in half.
I had this horrible premonition that something would go wrong when I got my license.
So I put it off, til I was about 17. (Since I was going to school about 25 miles away, my parents had a bit more of a stick and carrot than many might.)
I’d had my license for about three weeks (and was still driving on the old ‘pink slip’ back in the days when the DMV took almost a month to mail out the photo ID license instead of producing at the time of completing the requirements. Antediluvian, I know.) and then the car I was in committed suicide. Fortunately, I and the tree, innocent bystanders both, survived with only minor injuries.
In the environment I’m from, the idea of not getting your drivers license as soon as you possibly can is like having the opportunity to lose your virginity to Angelina Jolie and saying “no thanks, I’ll wait.” The freedom offered by a car is way too pressing of a desire for it to be put off. I only knew one guy who didn’t get his drivers license right away, and when he told me, I thought he must have been insane.
This is southern Indiana though. I’m sure it’s a very different situation for someone in a large city, in terms of being able to get around easily without a car. Still I can’t imagine a teenager not wanting to be able to have a set of wheels. The cost of gas, the risk of accident, etc - teenagers aren’t supposed to worry about that stuff! Christ, has the cultural message of the Beach Boys faded away already?
My son turned 15 in January, old enough in Illinois to get his permit and take driver’s ed. I haven’t heard a word about it. I’m not bringing it up! We’re in Chicago, so while he doesn’t currently take the bus or the trains, he could if he wanted to, pretty much anywhere he needs to go. He’s content with his bike. I’m content with car insurance bill right where it’s at!
I started working my way through Ontario’s graduated licensing program when I was 18. I didn’t get my full license until I was 22.
There was no rush to do it and I kind of miss taking the bus, it was so much more relaxing. My car is dinged up, scratched up, just got a chip in the windshield, and it doesn’t bother me. I’m just not a car person.
I’ve already decided that when I get married, we’re staying in the city and having a one-car household.
See, I felt freer not having a driver’s license. I don’t like driving, and I’d generally rather stay in than play computer games than go out (this was even more true when I was in high school and didn’t fit in particularly well socially). If you can’t drive, your parents can’t ask you to go to the store for them if that would require a car.
A key part of my Shabbat observance is “no driving on Shabbat, except to synagogue if you go”. The Sabbath is supposed to be enjoyable, and knowing it’s very unlikely I will have to drive during that 25 hours definitely makes it more enjoyable for me…
Me neither. My car is dirty outside and messy inside, and I don’t care. I couldn’t even tell you what kind of car any of the guys I dated drove.
Yeah- you can read, or daydream, or sleep while riding the bus. You don’t have to keep your eyes on the road.
I see this a lot among my daughter’s friends. She’s 16 and won’t get her liscense until she’s 17 this summer. I am going to make her get it so she can drive herself to soccer practices three times a week. They are about 20 miles away and I am tired of it.
When I got my liscense gas was around $1 a gallon and you could buy enough for a weekend by scrounging up change. I remember many time getting half a tank and paying for it without a single bill - just quarters and nickels and pennies. Today it costs $35 for a tank of gas, and kids see how much else they could do with that money. That’s a new video game, or three lunches or a bunch of movie nights.
It’s also the case that much of entertainment these days is home-based. I know tons of kids whose idea of a Saturday night is to get a bunch of friends and play video games all night in someone’s basement. When I was 17 my basement had a ping pong table and a washing machine. You had to go out to do anything fun.
Pretty much what **Argent Towers ** said. I grew up where if you wanted something, you had to get in the car and go get it. The vast majority of the country (geographically speaking) doesn’t have sufficient public transportation to make not driving a viable option. I wish we had more public transport available, but lets face it; there is no way anybody can justify putting in public transportation to a town of <1000 people in the middle of North Dakota. There’s not even enough justification to put it in medium sized cities.
I went and got my driver’s license as soon as I was legally able to do so; I registered to vote AND for the draft on my 18th birthday.
I don’t take the few privileges (or duties) the government gives me for granted; they are some of the very few things Joe Average can count on.
Yeah - you just have to keep them on the driver, to make sure s/he stays awake, or isn’t texting on her/his cellphone…
Let’s just say that I am less than satisfied with the safety standards that some bus drivers in my experience have shown.
I made it to level 2 of Ontario’s graduated license system before moving away from home for good. Without access to a car, I wasn’t able to get my full license and my license actually expired last near: now I get to start all over again.
Oh I know. I’ve been on two buses in the past week that made me nervous to be on, and it wasn’t even the drivers… it was the buses. Just the other day we were on a main road and the bus started rocking from side to side, not just a little but quite a bit, enough to make me wonder if we were about to tip over. (One other reason I am actively working for my license now… the scales have shifted in the favour of a car over sticking with public transit, different hassles but ones I’m almost glad to take on.)
If you’re driving, you are far from safe from those unsafe bus drivers…
I never thought of that, but you’re right. Gas prices only started skyrocketing after I started making real money, so I never thought about it from that perspective. It does often cost me over $30 to fill up my Honda Civic, and that’s a small car in an area without particularly expensive gas (at least not compared to the Bay Area, where I used to live). It’s not that unusual to see totals from previous drivers of $60 or more on the gas pump. And $30 was a lot of money to me when I was a teenager. It could buy a relatively inexpensive video game, or 3/5 of a more expensive one, or three cassette tapes.
I could be, though - know the bus routes, and then use alternate routing to avoid any street that the buses use. It’s possible. 
More seriously, there’s a sense, regardless of its accuracy, that if one has some way to control things, that one can at least mitigate the worst that might happen - be it on a bus, in a car, or even an airplane. IMNSHO, that’s part of what scares many of the people about flying - the fact that they’re completely at the mercy of the skills (and goodwill) of some strangers they’ve never met and will likely never meet. So, whatever the stats might say, it feels less unsafe to drive oneself than to ride.
Realistically, I worry less about the bus drivers than I do about the more aggressive drivers on roads.
I just can’t imagine sleeping on the local bus, these days.
I can be smug, at the moment, I’ve got the use of a car because of my father’s current medical condition. He can’t drive and my mother can’t always get him to his appointments. But if it weren’t for that, I’d still be using the buses. And will be going back to them soon. (Og willling)
Owing to being away at boarding school, I didn’t get licensed until 19. In 1986 Iowa this put you somewhere between mental defective and petty criminal in social status.
Because of my anxiety disorder, I never went through that “I’m immortal, nothing bad will happen to me” phase. I didn’t drink when I was underage or use drugs, because I was afraid of what would happen if I got caught (and I was sure that, if I did those things, I would have gotten caught). I didn’t skip school for the same reason. I did pretty well (but not well enough for my parents to make a fuss over) in classes, because I was afraid of not getting into college. I didn’t have sex, because I was afraid of getting pregnant. I didn’t drive, because I was afraid of getting into an accident.
For me, you see, it’s the opposite. If I’m not in control, if something bad happens, it can’t possibly be my fault. And I find it much more distressing for something bad to happen if it’s my fault. In those nightmares where I get into car accidents, I’m not upset over any physical injury (there never is any) or damage to my car, but the fact that it’s my fault. Oh, I’m also worried, in the nightmares, that my car insurance rates are going to go way up, or that I won’t be able to get insurance. I’m always quite relieved when I wake up from those and realize it was just a dream…
Oh, I wouldn’t want to, either. You might miss your stop, or someone might steal your stuff.
I am going to have to stretch the young end here. I grew up in rural Louisiana (motto: our kids grow up way faster than yours). I learned to drive at 13 and my parents got a divorce at 14. I had to start driving then to get groceries and take my younger brothers places. The police wouldn’t hold that against you. Louisiana had a 15 year old driving age in the late 80’s. I got my license on my 15th birthday and never looked back. I don’t really understand anyone that opts not to have a drivers license. It is a necessity in most place in the U.S. I am not sure about everyone else but public transportation makes me break out in hives and makes me lose self-respect by the minute. I love driving and I go out for recreational drives all then time including my lunch hour today.