To think 17 is too young to drive

[KimberleyClark]

Three teenage boys (described as mid teens by police have been killed in a crash in the Highlands). I cannot begin to imagine what their parents are going through.

https://news.sky.com/story/three-teenage-boys-killed-in-highlands-car-crash-13421075

My SIL has forbidden my soon to be 17 DN to drive until they are 21. I'm increasingly thinking she is right. She is a paediatrician and not ignorant of teen brain development. AIBU?

My colleague’s joy at her then 17 year old passing his test was mainly based round her not having to get up at 4am to drive him to early shifts anymore.

Banning all new drivers from having passengers under the age of 18 for the first year might be the best option, annoying for those who wait to learn until they are parents though.

Having another teen in the car does seem to be the biggest risk factor.

It is a dilemma, I agree about passengers and nighttime driving. However thinking back to when I passed (17, eldest child) my mum has night blindness so it fell to me to ferry siblings around and take my mum to put nan to bed. Luckily when I was learning they didn’t put pressure on me to pass. I hadn’t really realised, tbh. Now it would feel a bit of a responsibility, especially as I had a tiny sports car by 19!

I went to uni in a city and didn’t drive till I was in my early 20s but my brother went to agricultural college. It would have been impossible without being able to drive.
I understand the concerns but I’m also not sure about banning late night driving because hospitality is the biggest employer of young people in some rural areas. It’s hard enough to get waiting staff without making employers have to drive them home after dark.

I know it's a fantasy but imho girls should be allowed to drive (after stringent testing) at 16, like in the U.S. but "boys" not until, say, 19 or 20.
I know, many of you think I'm mad, but I'm sure it would save lives...

No I completely agree! I know it would never happen but we can’t really lump boys and girls together in this situation. The statistics show it’s groups of teenage boys that are the issue. Maybe not girls at 16! I always think that is madness in the US. But girls at 17 and boys at 19/20.

And I say that as a Mum of two teenage boys!

And then young parents/carers are disadvantaged

I think more bad accidents tend to happen on fast A roads for all age groups because of the speeds and hazards you mention. Dual carriageways and motorways tend to be straight and built for high-speed driving, so accidents are less likely to occur. And towns and cities have much lower speed limits so any accident is less likely to be severe.

Yes that's what I mean. Accidents on A roads tend to be worse because they can encourage the kind of risk taking that sadly young blokes are prone to. They are more likely to drive like idiots than the rest of the population.

They are over represented.

I know we can't legislate against everything, but their risk taking and showing off endanger all of us, so reducing the opportunity to do it would surely benefit the rest of us as well as them, e.g, by not allowing groups of them by law in the same car) between certain hours. Or would this simply encourage them to drive like even bigger idiots if they're spotted by the police? Loads of them seem to think they live in a virtual world and they won't actually die or end up paralysed etc.

My DD passed at 17 years 10 months. She's very sensible and careful. One of the brilliant things for us about her passing was that she could go and pick up her two younger (teen) siblings which saved me a lot of stress. Also working as a nanny she is often asked to drive children in her care.

I think there’s a huge difference between boys and girls as the stats show. It’s no hardship for all 17 year olds to not be able to drive with a car full of other teens to reduce accidents. An adult would be fine. Just not groups of teens.

17 and forbidden ! Jeez. I'm sure he can book his own lessons etc if he's paying for them. My ds did.

Dd passed at 17, 4 years ago. Now drives coaches. Never had an accident or anything.

I made sure both mine were confident on the motorway too. The day they passed we went straight up and down the motorway coming off various junctions that they were likely to use for work and college

Ah got you. My thinking was that A roads can catch people out and if you have an accident they are more likely to be serious. And young people (or any new driver) is inexperienced which increases accident risk. I think A roads are more likely to have a higher serious accident and death toll even when teenagers are driving sensibly.

I do think showing off, distractions and a feeling of invincibility are also issues. Though in the case which made OP start the thread, we have no knowledge that any of these played a part.

I think that if cars were only invented now we wouldn't be allowed to have them on the roads. There would be so much safety and risk involved.

I think it's terrifying that 17 year olds can be "in charge" of such a dangerous machine.

But alive & safe which more important.

A year of a minor inconvenience to young drivers is a small price to pay.

The families especially the children of people killed on the road face greater disadvantage - and that lasts for their whole lifetime.

The young people killed on the roads won't ever get to be parents themselves.

Quite.

Plus it's much easier to learn to drive when 17 - 21 simply because you often have greater flexibility and more time available to learn. This gives you more job opportunities too. It's something that affects your employability.

The thing that's prohibitive is the cost of insurance really.

The thing is for many young people it is not a year of mild inconvenience, it is a year of not being able to access work and education. With full time working parents and no other access to transport it becomes vital. I do fully understand the concerns and I do think that there should be a minimum number of lesson hours completed.

I want my DS17 to learn as it's a life skill (like swimming) but infinitely more usable day to day as we live semi rurally.

Strangely though he hasn't been tempted to learn yet and it's lifts from Mum &Dad and train to 6th form

I got my licence at 15 (NZ in 1981)! 17 seems reasonable (my DD got hers at 17 as we live rurally and she needed it for school; then covid hit and she barely drove for 18 months) but like others think a graduated licence would be sensible, particularly wrt to passengers. I’d apply it to all new drivers not just 17-21 and all need a black box for 3 years minimum. Longer if they’re shown to be driving unsafely. I think it’s a combo of age and inexperience, with inexperience being the greatest danger.

FWIW regarding motorway vs A/B roads - my sister and partner visiting from NZ found the windy B roads and unlisted lanes far more difficult to drive on than motorways. Totally unused to the dangers and the speed some people travel at.

The trouble, IMHO, is that there has been a recent increase in either very selfish or unobservant driving. I worry about my DS having to deal with that in 3 years time.
Eg people getting stuck at the end of slip roads, due to nobody being willing to accomodate them joining the road. I've been driving for 33 years and it's only recently I've seen this sort of behaviour on a regular basis.
Roads have become more dangerous,and it's not just because there are more cars.

I meant to add to my first post, my state has a graduated driver’s license program, specifically for students. At 15, they can apply for a student permit, but must have proof they’re in full time education, sign up for driver’s ed, attend several in person classes either at school or an academy, and complete at least 6 hours of one on one driving with an instructor. They also have to self log another 50 hours (12 nighttime) supervised driving with a licensed adult over the age of 21, usually a parent. It’s very tightly monitored with several safeguards in place to ensure no stages are skipped (apart from the self logging lol). Once this is complete, as soon as they turn 16 they can take a written exam and a comprehensive driving test, including motorways and other challenging manoeuvres, which entitles them to an ‘intermediate’ license.

The intermediate license comes with some pretty strictly enforced restrictions including curfews, no driving from 11pm to 5am without a licensed adult over 21yo, no transporting more than one non-immediate family passenger under age 21 between 6 p.m. and 5 a.m. unless accompanied by said licensed adult (fully licensed siblings over 18 are allowed though), and they’re prohibited from using cell phones at all, even hands free, unless it’s an emergency. At 18, as long they’ve had no crashes or violations, the license automatically becomes unrestricted.

Do these kids all necessarily follow these laws to the letter? Of course not. But in an area where we are very, and I mean very, dependent on self transportation, they’ve done a pretty good job of setting them up for success imo. The horrific late night crashes with cars full of teens or young adults are much rarer here than where I grew up in Ireland

What about the fact that my dc were working as lifeguards, with shifts starting at 6.30am or finishing at 10.30pm ?
What about their friend who drove himself to his shifts as a hospital porter?
What about the other friends who worked in supermarkets at all hours ?

Drink drivers are not, statistically teenagers. It is much older drivers that drink drive.

All of mine paid for their own lessons.
They worked in 6th form. For Christmas and Birthdays they asked the people who might normally get them a present (Aunts, Uncles, Grandparents, us) for cash instead and saved for
a) their driving lessons, licence, test, etc
b) towards their first cars and, more expensively, first insurance.

Plenty of young people do. I think you must be mixing with a limited social circle if you think parents are paying for all of this for their dc.

Limits on passengers is one of the restrictions in my jurisdictions. They can always transport parents, but the first year they can’t bring friends in the car. Then they graduate to one friend only. I’m actually not sure when they get more. I’m guessing at the next year, but we are currently at the one friend in the car stage.

I didn't start having lessons until I started my first job, then it took me two years to pass the test because I was finding manual gears difficult and had to switch to automatic to pass before the theory test ran out. So I was 22 when I passed the test. Got a car off my dad and drove it for 5 years before it was written off by another driver who T-boned me at traffic lights. Non fault accident. Then I successfully drove a Yaris and Aygos for years before I had another accident at a local roundabout that is essentially an accident blackspot and again was declared non fault as the other driver just didn't stop in time. So for those who said they never had an accident - you were just lucky lol.

There are various suggestions I can make but to keep it simple

1. Enforcement - across the board. If you lose your licence it wont be easy to get it back and if you drive when banned then crucifixion will be the lenient option
2. We need to address 'motornormativity' why dont we have the sort of public transport that most of Europe has so that everyone can get around without a car? Instead certainly in rural areas you have bus services that start after most people have started work and finish by about 4
3. There has been a lot of talk about 'hospitality' jobs - and it applies to other areas eg retail. If your job finishes after a certain time why doint employers have to provide transport or an agreed sum of money in lieu to pay for a taxi