To not understand the obsession with driving / red flag if partner doesn’t drive?

news alert - not every lives in London with good public transport.

How do you recon you get to places without a tube and shoddy and infrequent bus services. I need the car to get to work (could take it but it would take 2.5h each way for an otherwise 30 min journey). Nothing is close by. Not having a car/driving are very limiting. You would need an Uber a few times a day as you will find is a bloody big inconvenience not to have your own 4 wheels.

and again, not everyone is in London? Do you live under a rock and don't really know that things are very different in the rest of the country?

It's usually accompanied by loads of other stuff eg

"I don't drive dh Refused to drive me to hospital and wouldn't give me any money so I missed my appointment "

Or

"Made me get up at 6 to drive him to work when I'd been up all night with the baby and my c section was only three weeks ago "

Being the only driver and not being able to drive are both things that can be exploited but not usually a stand alone concern

I've not had a serious relationship with a non driver since being a student. I'm highly unlikely to have a serious relationship with someone who doesn't drive until I'm in my 70s. Other people can make different decisions. I don't want to be a chauffeur or the one always not able to drink

Because it's such a basic life skill and anyone who hadn't managed this would immediately give me the ick. Not to mention extra ick of always relying on someone else for basic independence. Just ick all round

I could exist without driving but my world would be very shrunken. Anything beyond walking distance in my neighbourhood would have to be done via a minimum of an hour walking, waiting and busing to the city centre to connect. Cycling is not an option on 40mph/NSL hilly roads, and I don't have a death wish.

To be a non-driver, you either need to live somewhere well connected or with lots of services on the doorstep or have quite a limited lifestyle. Beyond major cities, public transport networks are normally quite restricted.

Children often complicate life without a car. Once they're 5, the cost of public transport for a family rockets. Then there's logistics such as nursery drop offs and work start times that simply don't join up without car use.

If one of us became a non-driver for medical reasons, it's something that we'd have to suck up and adapt around. I wouldn't appreciate living with someone who was never bothered about attempting to drive though.

I've tended to find people that don't drive for medical reasons are quite practical about where they live. I have also encountered the whingy type of non-driver who believes that the world owes them a lift. I would not want to be married to one of them.

Well, that's an odd segue! I would "cope" the way I do most of the time - which is catch public transport and/or walk. I don't drive much, but I can drive, and have driven since I was a teenager and learnt to drive and got my licence. Somehow going through life and never learning to drive - whether or not you decide to keep a car - is to me odd. And as I said, fosters some very dependent behaviours in people I know who are already in many ways what I would consider dependent types.

Well, yes, there is that.

Out of interest, how would you cope if you couldn't drive suddenly for medical reasons, or something happens to your car? I have found it interesting when independent, mature car drivers can't cope with getting on a bus.
Aside from the snow issue I mentioned upthread, during the petrol crisis I was somewhat entertained by the number of drivers in our area which I had been navigating by train and bus for years with no problem who just didn't know what to do and were wailing about not being able to get to work, etc. Never mind buses, one woman I worked with phoned in citing no petrol and she lived 20 minutes' walk away. And no, she hadn't any disability, she just never walked anywhere and it didn't occur to her to try.
It surprises me how many grown adults simply can't cope at all when they haven't got the use of their car, (with the exception of those who live rurally). And I say this as someone who gets the fact that I am restricted by not having a car, and would like to be able to drive.
Having a car is simply another dependency for many who can't function without one.

My unpopular opinion is that there are people on MN who make a big deal out of everything.

I drive. I didn't when I was younger. Some on here make out that driving is this enormous burden, it really is not. I am with you OP.

Yes, same. For me, it's a marker of dependency and immaturity. Also, breeds some very entitled and demanding people, in terms of expecting lifts.

Well, I don't even own a wheelie suitcase, but there's off the beaten track and then there's miles from any train or bus station. I'm just pointing out there are places you can't really get to without a car. Even taxis don't go everywhere, and much as I love walking, I'm not up for a ten mile yomp with a backpack at 9pm after a 6 hour train and bus journey. You might be, and fair play to you.
And I'm sorry about the kid comment, it's what I constantly hear from driving parents: 'If you had children you'd have to drive, you can't drag them about on trains or buses'. Daft of me really, since I went on trains a lot as a kid and loved it.

Shocked by some of the answers on here. If you don't feel safe on the road and think you're dangerous to others on the road it's very considerate not to drive. I'm not a natural driver, had 3 instructors and loads of lessons. I have ADHD which I feel is the root cause of my issues. I have problems with attention and I struggle with spatial awareness so being behind the wheel makes me anxious. Oh and my parking is laughable. I do drive because I have to get my kids from A to B. I'm aware of my difficulties so I drive really annoyingly slowly and am probably overly hesitant. I plan my trips in advance including parking and I don't do long journeys (one hour is my max) because it's too exhausting having to concentrate so hard when I have ADHD. I also avoid motorways as much as possible.

I don't always want to have to be the driver, so whilst not having a car isn't a red flag for me, not having a license would be something I found incompatible, unless the other person is prepared to pay for taxis for their share of the driving.
In town it's not a problem, but I like to get out into the countryside and have the freedom etc, so it is relevant for my lifestyle choices.

Also, some people who don't drive have an expectation that if you do, you'll ferry them around and give lifts, or pick up and collect all the time, and I'm not down for the imbalance there. Fine if you're ok to sort your own transport and take responsibility for the consequences of your decisions, not ok if you expect someone else to pick up the slack for you and go out of their way all the time.

When living in London you'd refuse to date someone who didn't drive? How completely ridiculous. (I'm a non driving londonder, as are loads of people I know).

Whether you're in London or not, learning to drive is very expensive, so judging people solely on that is hugely judgemental.

You live in a place with public transport system. Says it all. Would not want to be here with anyone who cannot basically function independently. ie transport themselves to nearest shop

Why does that matter when people who drive also use the same services?

So you can rely on grocery delivery and someone else drives the train or the bus or the taxi while you get some work done or chat with DS?

Are your groceries delivered by a man with a horse and cart?

Some of the answers on this thread are bonkers.

Non driver here, and single parent. Just to bust some myths here about non drivers …

I don’t rely on anyone for lifts, in fact I’d say I take more kids to parties etc with my child than most- I just take them by public transport 🤷‍♀️ .

I am very resilient and pretty much unflappable.

Yes, my DS and I do go on holidays using public transport in the UK and I promise changing trains is not a traumatic experience for him (love the poster who said they couldn’t ‘put their kids through that’)- we also get pretty off the beaten track. The trick is to have a massive rucksack, not a wheelie suitcase. Oh- and a brain. Funnily enough non drivers have those too.

We also go on holidays abroad, and manage very well thanks, without a hire car. We use public transport.

For the big shop, there is a marvellous thing- home delivery.

Yes, DS goes to sports and enrichment activities. We walk to them. We’re lucky we live in a place where that’s possible- but then again, as a non driver, I wouldn’t live in the sticks. (That having a brain thing again).

There are probably half a dozen times a year when I think “shit, this would be waaay easier for me and DS if we had a car”. And then I book a taxi. Half a dozen taxis costs me probably no more than £150-200 a year. I can’t even fathom how much less that costs me than having a car parked out front of my house for those 6 times a year I actually need it.

We do not live in London.

Reasons I don’t drive:

family were too poor to put me through lessons as a teen, and money I earned from PT work helped pay rent on the family home, so couldn’t be used on lessons.

Ditto when I went to uni. I was paying tuition, living costs… and also somehow supporting my mother. Driving was not a priority.

Then I moved to London and didn’t need a car.

Then I moved out of London to a place where I also didn’t need a car.

Insurance premiums where I live are crippling- I can’t afford to run a car when you factor them in.

The planet is burning. If I don’t need to drive, I shouldn’t.

I actually value the slower pace of travel (and the exercise!) that not having a car engenders. When DS and I are walking places, we have our very best chats. When I get the train to/from London for work, I have chance to catch up on work, read a book, or just rest my mind for a couple of hours- a rare thing in my life.

&c &c

…

Honestly this thread is just so dispiriting …

But it really hurts when people say I am lazy and everyone can drive because some people really can't.

Ignore such people. You are not lazy because you can’t drive. The same people to call you lazy are likely the same people who choose to drive to somewhere, they could walk to and back in under ten minutes.

You are being responsible and thoughtful by not driving and not risking your life and the life of others by being behind the wheel when you’re a liability. There are too many drivers that get behind the wheel knowing they’re a liability but don’t care because they think their right to drive trumps others’ safety. Better to know your limits than push them to appease people whose business it isn’t whether you drive or not.

We don’t all live in London!

My boyfriend and I both drive and have our own cars, and it would drive me mad (pardon the pun) if we didn’t. For a start, we both need them for work as… news flash… we don’t all have the public transport you do in London.

We do a weekly food shop instead of popping in daily/every other day, so usually come away with four or five big bags. We loosely alternate this, and it would irritate me if I had to do it every time cause my boyfriend didn’t drive.

Our weekends are usually spent at friends bbqs/doing a quiz at a friends house/dinners with friends etc, and they’re never crazy boozy nights, but people have a couple of glasses, so again, my boyfriend and I tend to alternate, it would annoy me if it was always me driving and he got to have a couple of drinks each time. All the other couples do the same, it’s not worth taxi fares etc as it is only a drink or two.

Finally, we both have hobbies/different social events going on through the week. He plays football on a Thursday night and needs his car for that- so would I have to drive him if he didn’t go? Or would he have to be that annoying friend constantly badgering his mates to drive out of their way for a lift? Where he plays, public transport would be a nightmare and just not really worth it. On the same vein, I have in the past had friends where they share a car with their partner, and often expect those of us with our own car to go out of our way to pick them up/drop them home after events.

To summarise, life outside London is a lot easier with a car each! It wouldn’t necessarily be a deal breaker for me, but I would MUCH prefer my partner to drive.

For me, it would be like considering a future with someone who said he didn't cook or clean or do laundry or parenting.

I will say I do think drivers who aren't reliant on public transport often don't realise what's there. I'm not denying it's more challenging, but I have never lived in a major city but always with good bus routes and a train station. One very small town I lived in, people, on hearing I didn't drive, said, 'but how do you manage? The buses are awful here'. Turned out they'd never used a bus, had no idea about the service at all. I did have one moment of smugness when the big freeze happened about 15 years ago. Really bad snow in the area and ice which hung about for weeks. After the big snow, I arrived in work, admittedly late, to be welcomed with open arms as the only member of my department who had made it in. All the rest were car drivers and lived along my bus route. They didn't even try because they couldn't get their cars out of their drives.
That said, as I said before, it is restrictive, and I do wish I had managed to drive.

Do you need to get it?

I didn’t date men that couldn’t drive. I value driving as a life skill, personally, but that doesn’t mean that you or anyone else has to. We’re all entitled to our own dealbreakers based on our own criteria.

I’m currently driving in Italy because my Italian DP doesn’t drive.

When you are driving down a twisty mountain road in the dark on the opposite side of the road you are used to after a 14 hour journey to visit HIS family you start to think yes this is really fucking irritating.