To think adults who can't drive are a nuisance

[Atthewelles]

Barring situations where an illness or financial circumstances proscribe it aibu to think adults who can't drive are a PITA. People have to constantly go out of their way to collect/drop them off places; arrange plans around the times that suit the non-driver who can't travel solo but has to tag along with you; always be the designated driver who can't have a drink while the non driver happily slurps a third glass of wine etc etc etc

Yes, I have been spending too much time with a non driving sibling over the family Christmas but AIBU to think that a perfectly functioning adult (who is extremely technically minded) in full time paid employment, should bloody well learn to drive.

I can't drive. I tried, I have had lessons. I might just about scrape the practical in an automatic, but I can't do the hazard perception bit of the theory. At all.

So I manage without a car. I very rarely get lifts anywhere - I get the bus, or the train, or a taxi, or I walk, to where I need to go. A car would be helpful sometimes (if we were going on a weekend away it would avoid cross London tube hell, so I could drive to Ikea my friends houses in Essex, for taking the DSs to football/cricket matches in the arse end of nowhere) BUT it's not an essential for me, nor for a lot of other people like me.

It really depends where you live. When I was in Maida Vale there was nowhere to park and taxis were readily available so it seemed silly to keep a car and I only drove when I was in the country. Now I live in the middle of nowhere and made my kids learn to drive (on my land) as soon as their feet could touch the pedals.

As for designated drivers, club together and use a taxi. Much fairer.

Oilcoholics.

YABU we are saving the environment and keeping cabbies in business

(I do have a licence but live in London, partly because I hate driving)

I understand that the OP is saying, I think, in that its not that non drivers are a pita, it's the piss taking ones that are - and I agree. Those self sufficient non drivers who don't inconvenience others -fab. I would happily go out of my way for you if need be but the ones that have you rearranging everything around them and treating immediate family like unpaid chauffeurs are not fucking on and yes, they should bloody well learn to drive. not talking about my mil at all, oh no

^ That's true, but OP pretty much lumped all of us in together. Her only exceptions were medical/financial.

I did four tests. I have anxiety issues about driving from having spent an awful lot of time as a child and young person being driven about by my severely alcoholic father who would fall asleep at the wheel, weave all over the place, had collisions with us in the car, would roar abuse at you if you tried to get him to stop. I still have nightmares about it. No one knows this is why I don`t drive. It always saddens me that people are about me not driving. I hate not being able to drive but after spending 5k on learning and being in a state of panic in tests and failing by one major on three despite instructors telling me I am ready I feel I am not in a place to continue for now. It holds me back at work and it results in double commuting time and makes me feel like crap. It particularly annoys me when those judging had driving lessons at 17 paid for by the Bank of Mum and Dad.

the test is too hard on nervous drivers i think. i've failed a few times for that too, but yet i see 17 year old boys driving around, with four more school boys crammed into the back of the car and I think 'you are fucking kidding me? he passed and I didn't (again)'. I don't believe it. It would make you see red. It is a pain not being able to drive (legally) but I'm not the PITA. it's the money making racket of a system that is the driving school industry.

I get annoyed too when things are arranged for places that you can ONLY get to by car. I am usually very independent jumping off buses and trains and walking. But sometimes you've no choice but to ask for a lift.

I think the driving test should be continuous assessment - i.e. new drivers get assessed over several hours, perhaps by their instructor, like the Pass Plus.

I had the frustrating experience of having two different instructors tell me I was ready for the test, several years apart, and driving hundreds of miles and hours and hours, safely, with someone in the passenger seat... Yet failing my test five times because I get nervous under test conditions!

It cost me thousands of pounds... In the end, I reconciled myself to the expense by thinking "Ah well, £30/week is pretty much what insurance will cost me when I do eventually pass"!

I hear you flow4. The amount of money I've spent trying to be legal. If driving instructors had the power to do a continual assessment form of test then I think that would suit me better. Other people who suit the short sharp effort required to drive perfectly for just half an hour might not benefit from that system of course. I am only in my early forties but tbh I've given up on ever driving. It just doesn't seem worth it. I could sink hundreds into it (again) and only frustrate myself. And that's before you buy a car and run it.

Oh goodness
Don't make me think about the test
The reason I never did a levels was I couldn't face any more exams/tests. I hate them and crumble

thunksheadontable why don't you tell people why you don't drive, they would be v sympathetic.

It's possibly the humiliation YOU feel for your father's behaviour but it was nothing to do with you. (also had an alcy father)

I fucking hate buses. They stink, they cost a fortune and take ages. £3.75 and 45 minutes for a ten mile trip that would take me no more than 15 minutes at my convenience, not once an hour.

I can't drive. I have failed my test numerous times and been learning on and off for 19 years. I have spent thousands on lessons. I am utterly shite at it, not to mention dangerous. I consider it my gift to humanity NOT to get behind a wheel.

I never ask for lifts, and now i live in a rural area, spend about £30 per week on taxis.

DP drives and we still get taxis out so he can have a drink. It just wouldn't be fair if he couldn't.

Adults who can drive and choose to do so all the time when they could easily walk or take public transport ABU.

Their choice to clutter the roads with their personal metal boxes at every opportunity is a nuisance for public transport users.

I'll walk to school but I'll be fucked if I'm spending time and money to go to work when I've got a car in the drive. Getting a bus would defeat the point!

Our car - which needs to be reliable for hubby's job is costing us £250 a month for 4 years to buy, road tax is another £11 a month and insurance another £30... tyres are about 1 new one per year on average so say another £10, servicing and MOT another £30, petrol for non-work use is around £60 a month....

So around £400 a month- would pay for a fair few bus trips..... or taxis... hence we have one car.. I walk and bus it anyhow since hubby has the car for work, if he didn't need it then we would get rid of it completely....

spuddybean, that's a good idea really. i should take a taxi next time i need to be somewhere not on transport route. still so much cheaper than getting a car.

But sometimes you've no choice but to ask for a lift.

You get a taxi.

OP - while it is reasonable to be angry at your brother, some people are very entitled and annoying and some of those people also do not drive. But to put us all like that is a bit harsh - you are used to life with a car, you arrange your life that way, those of us without them are used to it and arrange out lives that way.

Like socializing, yours seem centered on going out places to drink. In my circle of friends, only 2 have licenses that I know of and only one still has a car. In the rest, 4 are medically not allowed to drive (though you wouldn't know that by looking at them and they're not likely to bring it up), including my husband who will only say he doesn't drive and wasn't good at it, most don't know about his medical reasons. So our socializing is mostly about hanging out at each others houses, playing games, painting, and such. I open my house two evening a week at least for people to come over and do stuff together, typically more. One of my friends comes so regularly by cab that they know where he is going and who by his number and time of call. We don't drink anyways so always able to get people a taxi home.

As for caring for family, most people with disabilities and health problems that I know prefer to use their own support network other than their kids. My FIL and GMIL are very firm on this, the former won't even be a car passenger so any emergency would be by ambulance knocked out anyways (and for both we had to struggle to get them to do when they were obviously having heart problems). We no longer live close enough to give that kind of support (used to live with in-laws), and they travel less as there health deteriorates so we call them regularly, check that people are visiting them often and that their appointments and meds are going well, and set up electronics so they can do video calls now and see their grandkids more often if only by screen which has done more for their health than anything else I've seen recently. There are many ways to care other than driving.

I have 4 kids, a social life, and a business and run my general life without a car. Yes, they can be useful, but not having a car doesn't automatically equal someone who is an uncaring moocher. We just arrange our lives differently.

YABU and gosh these threads make me anxious. You just wonder how much people are hating you for these esoteric reasons like not having the right hairstyle or owning the right kit or so on. So much haterade.

Just for your files, I've managed innumerable 3am visits to hospital without a car.

You can't park near most hospitals anyway.

i dont drive, last time i checked i was an adult. i am certainly not a nuisance. i walk everywhere i need to go and enjoy it. people do not organise themselves around me and im normally the sober walking everyone else home type. i am however going to learn to drive this year but mostly for the.dc so we can go further afield.

Out of interest those of you who have children how did you get to hospital when you went in to labour if your DP didn't drive? When I was expecting DC1 the midwife asked me how I would get to hospital and I told her I would call an ambulance. She said this wasn't allowed and that if I did I would be charged for it. She suggested a cab. On the day we called 3 cab companies but none of them would take me when DH told them I was in labour in case I "messed up" their seats. So I had to get a bus. Whilst I'm all for public transport ( although I can drive myself) I have to say I was extremely unhappy and uncomfortable all the way there. DH still cannot drive 14 years later despite promising numerous times to learn. He is now an ex-DH.