To think driving is very hyped up?

[Countbinface39]

I recently passed my test at almost 40. It took me 8 attempts, I'd had lessons on and off over the years and resigned myself to not driving. It was a relief to pass, not because I desperately needed to drive but because of the social pressure.
I am glad I have the option and don't have to do it again, I genuinely believed I wasn't cut out for driving.
There's a lot of hyperbole around driving which didn't help. I had people telling me I'd 'finally get my independence' when I passed. I own my own house, lived alone abroad for years, completely financially independent.
Also 'your life will finally start!' I'd like to think it started many years ago! I've never lived in very remote areas so luckily I wasn't heavily reliant on it, I never got lifts. I paid for ubers etc. But that's hardly the same as someone giving you a free lift!
I think a lot of people project their own experience onto you- they're maybe thinking of being 17 and relying on parents to get anywhere.
Driving has certainly given me more options, but it's hardly this magic carpet- still have to pay for the car, insurance, deal with dangerous drivers, parking, traffic etc- people always forget those things!
Someone even said my partner must 'have the upper hand' in our relationship because he had a car, which is ridiculous. People work as a team, you could apply that logic to anything, people who earn more, etc.
Anyway, rant over! I've got myself a cheap little runner that gets me from A to B, that's another thing some people comment on, if it's under 10k,15k, whatever it's going to fall apart the minute you get into it. More nonsense, i think the stress of being the only non-driver got to me, i felt like it was a very normal part of life I'd never get to do, but I'm glad I've got it.

Yes completely appreciate that you would need to drive to have a social life. I’m aiming to move out of London soon so driving will become more of a priority for me

An In-person social life perhaps. Fortunately if COVID taught us nothing else, it’s that it’s possible to have a good social life without having to be in the same room as anyone else!

I've just remembered another highlight. This kitten is a regular passenger on the Derry Line in Northern Ireland:

Oh now then… there is an incentive to use public transport! ❤️

I have always wanted to meet George the Stourbridge Junction station cat!

If you think it is hyped up.. wait until you can drive, then are suddenly not able/allowed to.
It is fucking horrible, and you realise how much being able to drive enhanced your life.

My sister in law insists she doesn’t need to drive. She would rather do 3 buses and a two and a half hours trip than drive for 20 mins.

I can get in my car in my village and drive 4 hours to a village where family live. Public transport/ taxis? 3 times the price and takes at least twice the time.

I’ll take the car, thanks.

This is a reason not to become dependent. People who choose to live in walkable communities with decent public transport links aren't afraid to hang up their car keys when their eyesight gets poor and reactions slow in old age. They aren't the ones who end up killing a child because they pushed the wrong pedal.

Until they cancel/reduce the bus service and the local shops shut!

How many people can live within walkable distance of shops though? Car parks exist for a reason! Theres many many areas without decent bus links to anywhere and then (breaking news!) you have to lug your shopping home on the bus. Clearly a car, if you are safe to drive, has huge advantages. Not being tied to a timetable is another.

And parking in some places is shockingly bad. Where I live we have the combination of shit parking and shit buses but people manage fine.

But you don’t have to ‘lug’ your shopping home. I have never done a weekly shop in my life. I pick up something from the supermarket which is near the train station.

Neither do the people on buses, in taxis/ubers. Or non drivers during train/tube strikes.

Online delivery for the big shop!

Oh I am free as a bird during train strikes - I work from home on those days 😊

I hate driving. I luve in an area with a very high rate of serious road accidents. I don't worry about my own ability but the other idiots on the road.

There is an obsessive overtaking culture. If there's a car in front, you must overtake it, even if you're about to turn off.

Our local mainline station was run by a grey and white gentleman called Hector for years, sadly RIP.

I agree with you, OP.

Last year I geared myself up to learn to drive finally as I was nearing my 40th.
But when I sat down and figured it out, it actually made very little sense.

I live in a well-connected place with fairly decent public transport.
I'm fit and healthy and can walk or cycle to most places.
I get shopping delivered but I'm also within walking distances of lots of shops.

For everything else, I just get an Uber.
When you factor in all the costs (financial) associated with driving, getting Ubers is actually really cheap even for long journeys.
That's thinking about the financial costs, there are also the time and labour costs you're saving yourself too.

Are you implying that people with worsening eyesight and reaction times should continue driving?

No, I was replying to a previous poster and saying that just because you have some shops and a good bus route TODAY, doesn't mean they'll still be there in the future. That's common sense and the reality of lots of places in Britain today. Our village (several thousand inhabitants so more of a small town), had it all 20 years ago, several shops, bus route right down the main street etc. In just 20 years, all that's gone. The people who "chose" to live in the village due to it's amenities now have to go elsewhere.

Lots of the older residents are now reliant on taxis and cadging lifts, despite thinking they were "future proofing" themselves by living in a place with amenities! So, although they don't drive themselves, they're reliant on people who can/do!

But you could say that about anything. People buy houses to be near to good schools that can start to fail, to be close to an AONB that gets built on, to a market town that starts to decline, next to good neighbours that sell up and are replaced by sods. But in none of these cases do you get MN posters up in arms blaming the OP and telling them they’ve wasted/limited their life or are a burden to the people around them in the same way that you do on driving threads. It’s bizarre.

You don’t get posters frothing at the mouth to tell an OP she has limited her life and options when she has a child, or moves house for work, or buys a house that is dependent on a good local school etc. But if an OP designs her life based on not wanting to - or being unable to - drive, then all these posters come out of the woodwork. Why?

Yes indeed, all I'm saying is that nothing is "future proof", but some posters on here who don't drive and have based that decision on local amenities may find themselves in difficulties in later years when some/all of those amenities have disappeared as has happened in lots of places. No guarantees.

Has anyone based that decision on local amenities?

My lack of desire to go anywhere means my inability to learn to drive isn’t an issue. If it was then I guess I would be utterly fucked.

Until now, any time you traveled anywhere with your husband, he had to drive. I don’t think that’s fair.

Driving is a women’s issue. We owe it to ourselves and our daughters to have our own careers, pensions etc and participate in society on an equal footing with men.

Well I have a career, two pensions, own my own home and have other investments. But I guess my lack of a car is letting the sisterhood down.

Isn’t it ridiculous.

I have never been dependent on anyone for anything since I became an adult. But apparently being able to drive or not is the indicator of success 🙄

There’s a lot I find puzzling on MN but this driving thing is the most bizarre. Nobody I know in real life cares whether anybody else drives, but it’s such a hot topic on MN.

I wonder if it’s because so many posters lack the confidence to put in any boundaries with people who use them as a glorified taxi service and this is the only place they can take out some of that frustration?