Daughters - no driving licences

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Thu 12 Mar 2015 21:15
Daughters - no driving licences - oldroverboy.
Comment from a friend..
Why do neither of yr daughters have a driving licence?

They are 32 and 34.

The reply.. They live in a city with cheap and effective public transport..
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Thu 12 Mar 2015 21:57
Daughters - no driving licences - jamie745

I have little to add to that.

Are either of them available? Just in my age bracket is all.

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Thu 12 Mar 2015 22:13
Daughters - no driving licences - Chris M

But will they always live in a city with good public transport. I lived and worked in London for my first 39 years, but when my job moved to the South Coast, I wouldn't have been able to get to work without a car.

Not having a driving licence has the potential to limit life choices. You may never own a car, but it's useful to have a driving licence, just in case and the earlier in life you learn, the easier it is.

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Thu 12 Mar 2015 22:28
Daughters - no driving licences - jamie745

This huge difference between London and everywhere-else is apparent when Government's of all stripes are deciding what motoring tax to increase next. They live where you don't need a car, but everywhere else does need it.

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Fri 13 Mar 2015 08:04
Daughters - no driving licences - cocorico

There is a guy like that in my office.

As a result, he can’t attend a meeting in a different office without help from colleagues.

Basically, we’re his taxi driver.

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Fri 13 Mar 2015 15:54
Daughters - no driving licences - Andrew-T

Not having a driving licence has the potential to limit life choices. You may never own a car, but it's useful to have a driving licence, just in case and the earlier in life you learn, the easier it is.

Not only life choices, but job choices too. Even if the job doesn't ask you to have a licence, it can be a deciding factor.

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Fri 13 Mar 2015 08:01
Daughters - no driving licences - oldroverboy.

I have little to add to that.

Are either of them available? Just in my age bracket is all.

Sorry Jamie high maintenance!!! The younger one earns more than i ever did so expects a lot. The eldest would drive you nuts! The city is not London, it's Geneva, just as car hating too, but realistic as they have the best Motor Show in the world.
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Sat 14 Mar 2015 21:40
Daughters - no driving licences - Bianconeri

I have little to add to that.

Are either of them available? Just in my age bracket is all.

Sorry Jamie high maintenance!!! The younger one earns more than i ever did so expects a lot. The eldest would drive you nuts! The city is not London, it's Geneva, just as car hating too, but realistic as they have the best Motor Show in the world.

Worked there for a few years myself, fantastic, integrated public transport and, being Swiss, runs on time. It used to be 2 Swiss Feans (80p at the time) for 90 minutes teavel anywhere in the Canton. And they have trams!
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Fri 13 Mar 2015 12:42
Daughters - no driving licences - brum
Comment from a friend.. Why do neither of yr daughters have a driving licence? They are 32 and 34. The reply.. They live in a city with cheap and effective public transport..

Meanwhile the more likely reason is....Your friend is either too idle to teach them to drive, too mean/poor to pay for their driving tuition, or he and his daughters are too thick to realise that having a driving licence is often required for employment at senior levels at least. Didnt get the job cos you dont drive? Shame.

Driving is a key life skill that will be useful at some time in their lives.

There is no requirement to own a car if you have a driving licence. And you can hire a car any time its needed.

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Fri 13 Mar 2015 12:56
Daughters - no driving licences - oldroverboy.

.Your friend is either too idle to teach them to drive, too mean/poor to pay for their driving tuition, or he and his daughters are too thickto realise.............????

They are my daughters not my friends as stated above..

Thick, no, definitely no,

It is their choice, not to drive, just as it is their choice in what they do,

Yes it is a key life skill, but in the case of the younger, she sometimes travels, and as she works for a large private sector employer she is paid for taxis, and whatever transport she uses in the course of her job.

My brother also decided not to get a driving licence when he was younger as he did not want to be caught drink driving... as many of his/our friends were.

Does he/do they miss it, not at all.

Why do people think it is strange when someone has not got a driving licence.

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Fri 13 Mar 2015 13:45
Daughters - no driving licences - Leif
Why do people think it is strange when someone has not got a driving licence.
Strange:
  1. 1. unusual or surprising; difficult to understand or explain.
  2. 2. not previously visited, seen, or encountered; unfamiliar or alien.

It is unusual to find someone of that age who cannot drive. I learnt at age 35, I have a friend ~45 years old who cannot drive. I lived in London and Montreal and did not need a car. Or so I thought.

The truth is that you depend on public transport, or scrounging lifts from other people. And public transport is awful, except in some cities where it is the fastest way to get about.

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Fri 13 Mar 2015 16:16
Daughters - no driving licences - brum

They are my daughters not my friends as stated above..

Thick, no, definitely no,

It is their choice, not to drive, just as it is their choice in what they do,


Oops! Sorry, not reading thoroughly, bad choice of words and no offense intended

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Fri 13 Mar 2015 14:53
Daughters - no driving licences - Avant

Brum - I think that's too extreme a view, and ORB was very restrained in his reply.

It really is up to the individual as to whether to drive or not, and how to spend their money, although it's important to be self-sufficient and not expect others to chauffeur you. I'm quite sure that the youngroverbelles living in Geneva are happy as they are (and safe, given that Geneva is a long way from a certain gentleman in Suffolk....).

There are some 35 million vehicles in the UK of which nearly 30 million are cars. Personally I'm rather glad that not all of the 49 million adults have a driving licence.

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Fri 13 Mar 2015 16:03
Daughters - no driving licences - Leif
I'm quite sure that the youngroverbelles living in Geneva are happy as they are (and safe, given that Geneva is a long way from a certain gentleman in Suffolk....).

Hee hee.

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Fri 13 Mar 2015 17:23
Daughters - no driving licences - oldroverboy.
I'm quite sure that the youngroverbelles living in Geneva are happy as they are (and safe, given that Geneva is a long way from a certain gentleman in Suffolk....).

Hee hee.

Jamie , I would be afraid for you, not little mali.

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Fri 13 Mar 2015 16:18
Daughters - no driving licences - brum

Brum - I think that's too extreme a view, and ORB was very restrained in his reply.

I offer sincere apology for my harsh choice of words.

I still think having a driving licence can be as useful as having any major educational qualification. There is no need to own or drive a car.

Edited by brum on 13/03/2015 at 16:22

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Fri 13 Mar 2015 17:14
Daughters - no driving licences - oldroverboy.
Brum and avant

No offence was taken...

Orb

Leif, I'm now in Essex, it's the only way...
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Fri 13 Mar 2015 18:42
Daughters - no driving licences - Leif
Brum and avant No offence was taken... Orb Leif, I'm now in Essex, it's the only way...

If this refers to Suffolk, I think Jamie is there, or that is what I assumed. Otherwise, I am lost.

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Fri 13 Mar 2015 19:05
Daughters - no driving licences - gordonbennet

I admire their choices not to bother with driving licences.

Think of the amount of tax alone that we've paid in our motoring lives, money that we've already paid tax on before we could count it as ours, whether employed or self employed....and don't for goodness sake try to add up how much motoring has cost in real terms, you'll end up turning to drink, more tax.

OK they're in Geneva but if they lived here and didn't drive think how little extortion monitoring and control our own govts and public busybodies would have over them that they have on the rest of us, from spying to parking charges/fines to umpteen thousand potential road and driving penalties to licence fees etc...good for them, not cashcows like the rest of us.

Hmm thinking about that more i'm surprised a driving licence hasn't been made compulsory throughout the EU, must be some anti terror bilge they can come up with to force this through.

Edited by gordonbennet on 13/03/2015 at 19:07

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Fri 13 Mar 2015 19:21
Daughters - no driving licences - smallcar

I think not leqrnign to drive is becoming a lot more prevalent and even if you learn the previously near automatic step to car ownership is also no longer so likely.

My explanation is the greater % attending university has reduced permanently the no of people interested in driving. More people's early life is shaped by university and almost all are in city locations and in some cases are places where the university authorities actively discourage car ownership and use. Plus for that three year period a different mindset focusses minds on socialising with alcohol and studying in very dense surroundings where a car is useless. Plus people I find who have been through education have different attitude to what they gain status from eg your education. Who or what you do than what car you drive.

Aldo with so many graduate jobs being concentrated in London and a few other places you can see why the graduate population contains many people who never learned to or font use a licence. In lots of fields London provides the only place to work and provides a rich and deep market for professionals such that they never leave.

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Fri 13 Mar 2015 19:22
Daughters - no driving licences - Leif
Given the cost of public transport and taxis where I live, a car is a bargain.
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Fri 13 Mar 2015 19:52
Daughters - no driving licences - oldroverboy.
Given the cost of public transport and taxis where I live, a car is a bargain.

Where do you live? I am now in Cochester after a brief stay in tooting, (too manic for us) but had almost 13 years in geneva, and it was carp for parking then, my girls say it is worse now.

It is chf75 £40 ish for a monthly pass buses and trams and local trains,

so it;s a bargain.

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Fri 13 Mar 2015 20:03
Daughters - no driving licences - gordonbennet
It is chf75 £40 ish for a monthly pass buses and trams and local trains,

so it;s a bargain.

I suspect its a damn sight safer using public transport there too, for a variety of reasons.

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Fri 13 Mar 2015 20:20
Daughters - no driving licences - oldroverboy.

I suspect its a damn sight safer using public transport there too, for a variety of reasons.

Apart from the muggings bag snatchers and the druggies............

Read the Tribune de geneve , it will translate into english...

My first wife handbagged (a la maggie) some nit who tried to snatch her bag while the oldest one was in her arms in a shop. She gave the baby to a shocked shop assistant (hold this) ran after him, grabbed her bag and belted him!

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Fri 13 Mar 2015 21:05
Daughters - no driving licences - Leif
Respect!
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Fri 13 Mar 2015 20:27
Daughters - no driving licences - Leif
I am near Basingstoke. Were I to take public transport to work, it would take twice as long, at least, and cost far more. I'd have to pay to park my car at the station, wait for the train etc etc. If I go to London on a Sunday, driving is cheaper and quicker, even with only one in the car. Take 4 people and the train is absurd. We have few local buses. When I lived in Luton, I took a bus a few times. It was expensive and slow. I get about 60mpg from my petrol car. £20 a year tax. £180 a year insurance.

What I will say is that car sharing with self driving cars MIGHT be excellent, if we sort out cleanliness and vandalism, and the issue of having enough for peak times. But if we can have a system that schedules cars for 3 or 4 people, picks them up on time, drops them off on time, we might have 1/3 of the traffic.
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Fri 13 Mar 2015 20:44
Daughters - no driving licences - oldroverboy.

When we lived in Carmarthen it was the same for us, Travelling anywhere outside the town was terrible and for us travelling to London was much cheaper, again if only one in the car, but positively a bargain if 2 or more.

I got lost in basingstoke once in the "shopping area" took me a while to work out how to escape..

Colchester to London on the train is not a pleasant or cheap experience, so if we go, it's in the car.

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Sat 14 Mar 2015 09:50
Daughters - no driving licences - Smileyman

Driving is a life skill like swimming or riding a pedal bike - not everyone has or needs the skill, but it's always useful to have. Cars are expensive to own, and in a crowded city having a place to park a car can be almost be a luxury - I know peoople who don't own a car but hire cars when they need transport. There are always taxis too.

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Sat 14 Mar 2015 09:56
Daughters - no driving licences - Alby Back
Even though I walk a lot and cycle a lot, I'd hate to be without a car too. By and large if the journey is less than a couple of miles or so and especially in towns or cities I'll walk or cycle. If I need to go further afield or shift something cumbersome I'll take the car.

Not keen on public transport. It's a jolly good idea but the public tend to use it and some of them smell.

;-)
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Sat 14 Mar 2015 10:03
Daughters - no driving licences - ExA35Owner

I think the point has to be - having a licence gives you potential freedom and independence. If you have a licence you don't necessarily need to buy a car, but can buy, rent or borrow as needed. Certainly if I were misguided enough to choose to live in central London, I wouldn't have a car; but I'd still want my licence! And you don't need to live far out in the sticks before you find that public transport is flaky - with the exception of taxis. Once you are well away from town.... well, the village where I grew up had only two buses a week even in the 1950s, Saturday and market day.

And even in an area with good public transport, the flexibility of having a car and a licence allows my daughter to give her children a much more rich and varied set of activities.

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Sat 14 Mar 2015 21:10
Daughters - no driving licences - Bobbin Threadbare
I didn't learn to drive until I was 23, simply because I couldn't afford it. Went to uni in a very small city with good bus service, and on the West Coast Mainline for trains home. Also, Merseyside had subsidised public transport so as an older teenager, Merseyrail was a better bet for me than getting a car.

I couldn't have got a decent job without the car though....it would take me the best part of two hours to get to work on the train and cost nearly half of my week's petrol costs. I do enough mileage to warrant a diesel but hybrid does the job for now.

Edited by Bobbin Threadbare on 14/03/2015 at 21:12

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Sat 14 Mar 2015 21:21
Daughters - no driving licences - jamie745

You can't get anywhere worth going to owt 'ere in the sticks loike without a car. Yes you could live right in the middle of a big town, walk to work, cycle to the shops, only use the car for the weekly shop and all the rest of it, but that doesn't suit me because I don't like existing in a tiny sandbox with no horizon.

You've got to get out and about.

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