How would you manage if you lost your driving licence tomorrow?

It would be a bit of a nightmare, but we would cope.

I could work from home permanently. Can walk one child to school. Other child needs to go to a different school which is not walkable and would be the massive issue. I can see us managing through a mix of DH rearranging work to do more drop offs, arranging a couple of transport shares, and my mum doing some pick ups.

The loss of independence would hit me very hard though. Not being able to pop out (our village only has a pub), not being able to pop in to feed my mum’s cat.

YABU to say that we should all take this in to account though. Like the people who say you should have someone at home in case the schools close, or only relying on one salary if you have two.

We had a long spell without a car which only ended at the start of lockdown. We managed by hiring a car occasionally and using buses and taxis. Our local public tansport has pretty much collapsed since covid and is now expensive, unrealiable and irregular. Most of our local taxi firms only do school runs and booked longer trips to airports - it's not economic for them to be more available. There's no uber here. Our daily lives would be fine without a car, as we deliberately chose to be walkable to our daily needs. But the fun things in life would be very difficult - we would be locked into our small town which lacks shopping, cinema, cultural things like museums/theatres/concerts. DC would be limited to clubs and friends within walkable distance. There is no functionable bus service to our local train station (3 buses a day which do not match up with any trains). Cycling to the train station would be an act of suicide and it's over an hours walk with no footpath along a main road and windy country lanes.

It would be a pain but not the end of the world .

I mostly work from home, but need to drive DD 15 mins each way to nursery. The bus would take forever.

It would curtail our freedom to do things and we'd spend a lot more time on buses.

Due to limited public transport here it would.be hard, my husband would have to do school runs and I would struggle to get to work (only 1-2 days a week though as wfh 3-4 days). My personal life would suffer eg going to gym classes, seeing friends and family).

I could get public transport to work but it would be tedious

i’d get round the local area on bike. I’d go back to online food deliveries. There is some public transport round here which helps.

kids walk and bus to school thankfully.

but my kids do lots of extra curricular and instead of about half my dh would have to do the vast majority. Which would be exceedingly difficult given his working hours.

YABVU, you're basically suggesting that no one should base their career on a job that involves driving. Eg I'm a community midwife, I couldn't get to my visits without a car - so no one should take up this job in case they get vertigo and can't drive? So we just don't have community midwifery?

People need to live their life, not be frightened of what ifs and so restricting their life.

I don't drive often as I live in London and don't have a car.

But I do increasingly drive my dad to and from hospital appointments in his car and it would be difficult if I couldn't. We could afford taxis and would have to do that. And beg for hospital transport if they need him to go to the other hospital 40miles away.

Wouldn’t matter too much tbh. Barely go anywhere, wfh. The kids riding and other stuff would be faffy but it wouldn’t be a huge disaster.

I clicked assuming this was about losing your license somewhere and not being able to find it! 😁

2yrs ago I lived in central london, so had no issues with transport etc then.
We've since moved 2hrs away and far more reliant on the car normally. Recently though, our car was at the mechanics and due to it being ancient, was there over 2 weeks waiting for parts. We both WFH anyways, so I ordered online shopping instead and it made little difference day to day.
On the weekend, we walked to the nearest high st and it was actually quite nice to walk, rather than use the car.

I would be devastated. No freedom without my car. I can't walk very far and can't use public transport. So I would be housebound.

Me too!
I live rurally and need my car, not just to get to work but to do my work I need to drive to a lot of out of the way places. Two of my kids couldn't get to school. We'd have to move.

I would be ok I think - easy walking distance to work, the train station, town, vets, GP and several supermarkets. Would still be pretty restricting though.

None really. I’d be impacted on cheap holiday choices and some leisure activities, but in the main I’d be able to carry on as normal

I went through a patch of attacks a few years back.

It's much worse than just a dizzy spell.

I couldn't stop vomiting, couldn't focus my vision. The room was literally spinning much like when you are extremely drunk. I couldn't walk without falling, and it lasted days each time.

Nothing like feeling a bit dizzy when looking down from a height, and in no way connected to the feeing of height.

My mum had cancer in various places and at one point she had a tumour in her brain. Steroids and chemo etc were successful and the tumour shrank away. On her final check up with the doctor he told her she’d be able to drive again now she’d finished treatment. She was horrified. She didn’t know that she shouldn’t have been driving and had been carrying on as normal. Luckily nothing had happened!

I'd be fine, it would be an inconvenience but that's it. I don't drive to work and I could never live somewhere where I was totally reliant on a car anyway.

YABU, you can’t plan for every shit thing that might happen.

I lost my license after surgery for a brain tumour. It was a right PITA as I live in a city but work in a rural location. I got a disabled person’s buss pass but that couldn’t get me to work.

I got taxis to work funded by Access to Work for a year which was a godsend. I helped a colleague who had on-call commitments get the same a few years later, it does exist but is little known.

It wouldn’t bother me. I wouldn’t notice. We don’t have a car as it is.

I don’t think lives should be planned around any sudden disability/death. I do think that there should be a Plan B if some common disabling event or death were to happen.

Would be a very hard for me. We live 6 miles from the closest bus stop which only has a bus every 2 hours. Only one taxi (ie. 1 vehicle) in closest town. In theory have DRT but doesn't really function due to lack of vehicles.

Daughter gets school bus so that would be fine, and I could probably negotiate WFH in that situation but would not be great for my job. I'd definitely feel very isolated as no amenities beyond a post box in my village

I think work would let me wfh, but as far as school runs (would be at least 1hr15 min walk each way, no public transport available) after school activities etc, I'd be buggered. We're rural, no neighbours within at least a quarter of a mile in any direction. We do get shopping delivered, but for any Dr's appointments, vet visits etc, we'd be screwed. Even the nearest corner shop is over an hours walk away.

However, YABU. The infrastructure isn't there for folk living nearer all the facilities required as it stands now - where would you put all the rest of us who don't live near enough?

I lost mine a couple of months ago when the cancer meandered into my brain

Practicalitywise, it's been difficult and taxis cost more than car parks. People give me lifts, DH drives more

What's is so very hard, is the loss of independence. You just don't realise

You must have a lot of free time to spend navel gazing. Most people don't think about it because, well what are they supposed to do? Even if it is a privilege? So what?

I'm the only driver in our house, but I hate it so made sure we live close to acceptable public transport ('acceptable') for the NW. Things will take me a little longer and cost more, as I only drive to work with free parking while the peak time trains cost much more. But hey ho.

I can't drive due to a fainting disorder, it's just not safe for me to be behind the wheel. I live close to work and the kids school so there isn't a huge issue, the majority of friends and family are within walking distance or on public transport routes and family and friends are generous with lifts if needed and convenient for them.

However if DM lost her license tomorrow, her world would collapse. Her friends are spread around the country and she drives long distances to visit them every month or so for the weekend. She has very few friends in our city due to moving away and only recently moving back.