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

Are you really that narrow minded and ignorant?

Even in Manchester it's acknowledged that public transport is far below standard - which is why it's just had to take action to bring buses under city wide control and make efforts to make it a) actually affordable b) integrated.

Even now though the system goes to the centre but if you wanted to go around Manchester to the next borough over, you often have to go into town and then back out again.

Andy Burnham has had to campaign and work hard to try and bring it up to standard.

And then there's the appalling train services linking northern towns which aren't fit for purpose and had upgrading schemes axed for financial reasons.

For places outside the towns bus fares have been more expensive than taxis and much more expensive per mile than London (us northerners have subsidised London transport costs for many years)

But yes, do carry on lecturing about how stupid I am in saying there's no public transport outside London...

When the issue is that public transport outside London isn't fit for purpose and isn't remotely comparable to London even in the areas with the best provision.

... I have no issue with you making yourself look daft.

Because driving is a chore. I do not enjoy driving and we live somewhere where we don't have to drive most days. I always prefer to cycle or walk. But sometimes it needs doing.

Not a chance I'd choose to be with someone who wasn't going to share the chore of driving, any more than I'd be with someone who wasn't ever going to cook the dinner or do the washing.

When I lived in Cirencester the last bus was about 6pm. Maybe it's later now. The train station is a couple of miles away and once I arrived there on a Sunday afternoon and i tried to get a taxi. In the end I managed to call a mobile number of a taxi driver and he came to get me after he finished bingo.

Some places you need to drive. Where I live now there is great public transport if going into bigger towns. We wouldn't be able to get my children to weekend sports competitions without expensive taxis or hotels and many parties are off the bus route. To get to work which is a 20 minute drive would be 3x that as would need a couple of busses.

People forget that not everywhere has the infrastructure of a big city.

I used to live in a (non-London) large city and public transport was not good, so driving still needed for having any semblance of convenience or flexibility.

I always see non-drivers on mumsnet insist they are completely self sufficient and don’t impose on anyone, I have literally never known this to be the case, every single non-driver I have met expects help from others in some way, they just often don’t see it as “you’d be going anyway” “I’ll get a taxi to yours so you don’t have to collect me on your way”.

I remember one friend being aghast that I asked for petrol money when I drove her to the lakes as “you’d be going anyway”, er yes but it would be nice to have shared the driving on the two hour journey let alone the cost.

There were loads of places I needed to drive when I lived in a city - goApe, local nature reserve, safari park, supermarket etc. I think in almost all circumstances kids miss out without a driving parent.

Red flags are a very personal thing though. What isn’t a big deal for one individual is anathema to another. Having a non-driving partner isn’t a problem for me, that said, he gets himself around and doesn’t nag for lifts.
And no, we don’t live in London.

I live very much in the north. A long way beyond Birmingham and not in a city either. We do have buses you know, in the North. Bloody good service where I am in North Yorkshire, £2 will get you a long way. The only people who think you can't get anywhere without a car where I live are people with cars. Because they don't need to use it, they assume the busses are crap and that they couldn't manage.
It's easier to drive, yes. But there's plenty of places outside London where you don't 'need' to drive and it isn't necessary to cadge lifts at all.
Despite fully acknowledging my regrets about not mastering the art of driving and accepting it is restrictive, the more I read this thread, the more I realise how dependant car drivers actually are.
Instead of feeling like some helpless, hopeless no-mark, this thread has buoyed me up somewhat, made me realise that actually it's quite an achievement to have made it to 50 without being able to drive and not been a total shut-in who can't go anywhere without imposing on friends and family, considering the fact that so many of you think that is impossible to do outside London.
I'd still like to drive, but it's good to know I must have some basic life skills since I have achieved the apparently impossible feat of living independently from parents since I was 18, working, paying off a mortgage, going on holiday, travelling the length of the country because my relatives are spread all over it, and all without being a massive burden to anyone, because I don't do a job without ensuring I can get to it without a lift, my legs don't fall off if I have to walk for ten minutes and I am not embarrassed to do the weekly shop with a massive granny trolley on wheels which I walk to Sainsbury's with.

I think it’s a huge red flag and will probably be flamed for this. Of course it isn’t for you OP you live in London where there’s fantastic transport links and the majority don’t drive.

i dated someone who didn’t drive and it caused so much resentment. He did end up learning in the end. I hated the fact when we went on holiday or to the cinema or even anywhere I had to drive. We would go to the pub for a meal and he could never say oh you have a glass of wine and I’ll drive this time. It was on me all of the time. It was a lot.

I dreaded the idea of having children with someone who couldn’t drive, who couldn’t do the pick ups without a car seat. I even panicked about being in labour or ill in hospital and having to pay extortionate fees for a taxi. Luckily it never came to that as we didn’t have children- but it does make me and wrongly so, if you don’t have a disability or a genuine reason- get annoyed with people who don’t drive, especially those who happily cruise along in life accepting lifts.

We live in a large town which on paper, looks like it has a decent bus service. Theoretically I should be able to get a bus from 30 seconds away from my house and get off 30 seconds from my work, but when I started taking this bus, it never ever managed to get me both to work and home again on the same day. The buses were every half an hour, but you’d be waiting at the bus stop looking at the app and would see a 6 minute delay, which would increase to 10/15/28 minute delay and they would say cancelled and disappear altogether! The same with the next one! I went back to driving which is a nightmare because there isn’t enough parking, but at least I’m not going to be late for work.

I git my first car when i lived in london over 40 years ago - changed my social life!

i could drive up to Norfolk to see family on a friday night and on sunday drive over to suffolk to see my sister before coming back to london. Also when visiting friends outside london i didnt have to expect anyone to pick me up from the station and drop me back.

i had a friend come out of london to a lunch party - she decided not to drive - ended up at a station 40 minutes away so someone had to leave the party to go and pick her up - thats 80 minutes! Not impressed.

I think a lot of non-drivers don't realise how independent a car makes you.

I never drove until my late twenties for a whole number of reasons and I'm not exaggerating when I say that passing my test changed my life overnight.

I suddenly had all this freedom I never had before. I could wake up and go wherever I wanted - no worries about cancelled trains, bad weather, strikes or anything getting in the way. It was a genuine revelation.

But none of that means I want to drive all the time and always be the one who has the responsibility. I enjoy driving but it's tiring, especially in new places, and on long drives I find I get aches and pains and a bit of a headache. I'd not want to be in a partnership with someone who couldn't share the burden.

Oh, agreed. No argument. I just meant that I made use of facilities I'd paid little attention to before, as I could drive. Some of those facilities, like the subsidised taxis, were not advertised anywhere and I found them by pure chance.

x-post. I have an ex who didn't drive and all his friends didn't drive. They were all pathetic 30-something indie schmindy milquetoastes who dressed up their inadequacy and fear in vague quasi moral objections to things they had never faced up to learning to do. When they were just drifting about in london and brighton on their pathetic packet-catered picnics, this was not much of a problem, but every now and then they had to get somewhere else and they just looked blank and assumed someone would drive them. Hardly any of them went on to have children but those who did often got together with women who drove and my contempt and irritation with those men is boundless. I will admit that this is heavily loaded with the contempt and irritation with my ex in particular.

My partner doesn't drive, it's a PITA but wouldn't say it's a red flag, he's a good egg ❤️

@Simonjt but there are lots of small towns where none of that is an option - there's no public transport, no taxi (unless you book well in advance) and no way of getting about without access to a car.

I was more interested in how non-drivers who live in areas with good public transportation are seen by people.

Well, even in areas with good public transport, it's often much more convenient to be able to drive.

You can go straight to your location, you don't have to worry about what you'll do if the train is late or cancelled, you can change your plans last minute without having to think about transportation etc.

I mean, where I live today, we had bad floods overnight and all the trains are cancelled, but the roads are fine - and that's not uncommon. So anyone relying on public transport to get anywhere is screwed, and likely will be for the rest of the bank holiday.

Whereas those of us with cars can just carry on as normal without having to worry.

I know, I used to live in a small market town, I didn’t drive, so I walked or cycled, if I wanted to go elsewhere I either got taxi there or I would get a taxi to a bus stop or train station. It wasn’t difficult, it was also cheaper than owning and running a car.

My hubby stopped driving years ago partly down to finance but he never like it either. He has a new health condition now which makes him more nervous to start again but he alsk doesnt care about having a car and doesn't want too. At 43 I'm taking lessons again(suspected adhd), tried in the past and found it too much. I am doing OK atm(doing automatic) and have a good instructor but it worries me the amount of things/rules there is to remember. Even if I pass I wont be driving long distance.

So we manage on public transport in a rural part of the UK. My work is 10 mins walk and the kids schools are in walking distance too. Hourly bus to local town and trains every 1 to 2 hours to get you further. Occasionally I need a lift for dd to a school event, which I find embarassing, but thats it. We are used to it. I feel like such a loser when I read the way mumsnet thinks.

@Simonjt and what about the millions of people who don't live in cities or large towns?

"outside London" doesn't just mean "in other large cities" 🤷‍♀️

I didn't learn to drive until I moved away from London.

Of course it is possible to design a life for yourself where you don't need a car, but it is not fair to judge others for having requirements for certain kinds of flexibility that do involve having to drive or drive + have a car. You have chosen to live in London, which at this point in my life doesn't work for me because: I can't afford a family house (I have two kids); too far from my parents (they're getting old); damages my mental health (I can't do a london commute any more, or live in London dwelling densities, I just can't, I am just burnt out from it). If you know for sure that none of these things will ever be a problem for you, fine, but if you decide on principle that you will never have a car or, worse, learn to drive, then you are putting that principle above being available to me as a partner when I am having to make my decisions. So of course it's fair for me to discount you as a partner. You are free to have your principle, I am free to honour my own needs.

(That is before we even get into the fact that in practice people who don't drive are often at least a bit lazy and freeloady but that's just anecdotal rather than necessarily baked in)

I think you are missing the point that posters are making - not all of us live in towns and cities.

We have one train an hour here. Today they are very delayed because of the weather. As it is a single track line with very few passing places the trains are all over the place timewise.

Are you really pretending that public transport doesn’t exist outside of London? How do you think commuters get to London to go to work? Ever heard of Lincoln, Nottingham, Leicester, Portsmouth, Birmingham, Manchester, Newcastle, Glasgow, Bath, Liverpool, Wrexham, Chester, York, Leeds, Sheffield etc?

"cities with good transport links"

You mean London.

There is a huge amount of political debate about the poor public transport in every other UK city. Even ones with supposedly good provision, it's still massively limited and patchy and not integrated hence Andy Burnham launching a massive initiative to rectify this, change fairs and bring buses back into public control.

People in London are fricking clueless sometimes.

You live in London.

Engage your brain as to why this might be an issue.

Perhaps go outside London and see what public transport is like. Oh wait, you can't, because you can't get to those areas because you can't drive.

Seriously. London centric idiocy at its finest.