<p>The cost for the ID and a DL was about the same. DS found that the DL had greater validity with the TSA people. He did not have a car. </p>
<p>Now fully independent at 24, he walks to work in Seattle and uses our old car just for grocery, visiting us in OR, or hiking trips. Saves on insurance expenses. </p>
<p>I think its not only a lifestyle issue where there are good transportation alternatives to owning a car but also a economic issue where there are alternatives to spending that $$. The tailend reason is environmental.</p>
<p>I got my permit at 15 like people do here, but didn’t get my license until I was 18. I didn’t have the motivation, mostly because I was not ready to drive. It scared me too much and I had nowhere to drive to anyway and no car, wasn’t worth the stress. Might have been different if my best friends hadn’t had their licenses since I was 14. I started practicing for the road test maybe two or three months before my permit expired so I could get my license in July in advance of starting community college and needing to commute, it was MUCH easier for me then. I think some kids just need more time. My younger sister is turning out to be the same, I think. My older sister didn’t get her license until she got married and her husband taught her. Not sure what’s with the trend in my family! </p>
<p>I got a state issued ID at 17. It sucked when I went to go to my first R rated movie that I wasn’t sneaking into and was denied because the only ID I had proved I was a senior in high school, not my age. I looked 20, but no good! I am glad I got my license at 18 though, because I would rather live with my parents for those first few years of driving like I got to. I think I needed their guidance when the weather was bad or when I ran into new situations and didn’t know what to do (and it was nice to go home to them when I had my first accident), and my dad had to drive me to school once because there was a blizzard during finals and I hadn’t had much practice driving by myself in the snow. Driving with someone else in the car and driving by yourself are very different at first. I am relieved I will be a seasoned driver by the time I go out on my own for real after graduation.</p>
<p>Back home, the state IDs don’t seem as readily accepted as DL & D Permits (except with seniors who are no longer driving). I hadn’t really thought about D getting a state ID, but I guess if she isn’t around when her permit is ready to expire, she’ll have to look into it.</p>
<p>When each S got their permit at 15, they became the family chauffeur. Pretty much every time the car left the driveway, they were driving with me riding shotgun.<br>
They drove us to church,shopping, restaurants, friends houses, vacations, on the interstate,everywhere.
In our state, they have to drive with their Permit a full year before getting their license.
We wanted to make sure they had plenty of practice.</p>
<p>They both loved driving and could not wait for the independence of having their license.
There is no way they could have done all the things they did in high sch. if they had not had their driver’s license. It’s a big deal for most kids here, especially boys.</p>
<p>Where we live its VERY important, for a boy especially, to not only have his license but to have his own car.(its some sort of reflection on their manhood, apparently). My 16 yr. old has a permit but no license because we said we wouldn’t be buying him one, so he said, “then why bother?” Means more driving for me but I really don’t mind. He does get ribbed about it, though, and the other parents have gently queried me on why he doesn’t drive or have a car like the other boys. I told DH that I’d like to GENTLY tell them that our son’s private college education with no scholarship will cost about 10x the cost of their sons’ cars, but so far have kept my mouth shut!</p>
<p>Drivers Ed (classroom portion) is a graduation requirement at my son’s school and all kids take it sophomore year. He’s a junior now and most kids get their licenses by the time they turn 17. State requires 50 hours behind the wheel and 6 months after getting the permit. So the youngest you can possibly be is 16 1/2 but since son wasn’t motivated during the summer when we had more free time, he’s now approaching age 17 with only four hours under his belt.</p>
<p>Doesn’t not having a license limit the college choices? My oldest son (college senior) drives himself to and from his college 6 1/2 hours away and has done so since his freshman year. On his semi-rural campus he uses his car daily to get from his off campus house to the college. I can see doing without a car when you live on-campus, but off campus? We’ve never lived in an area with public transportation so I find it hard to imagine living without a license unless you are in a city and most of the colleges we’ve been looking at are not in a city.</p>
<p>In Illinois, most people cannot get their permit exactly on their 15th birthday. To get the permit between age 15 and age 17 years 3 months, you must prove you are enrolled in a driver’s ed program.</p>
<p>There is no driver’s ed requirement in PA, only the 50 hours behind the wheel with an adult. There are no high schools in our area that offer it. So kids learn from their parents, and learn all their bad habits too!</p>
<p>I wouldn’t consider not having a license as affecting college choices, because I don’t think my S would think that far ahead. I do think having a car would be helpful for off campus living as a junior or senior.</p>
<p>I’m 24 and just now taking driving lessons.</p>
<p>Honestly, the main reason that I didn’t before was that I was afraid of both driving and other drivers. When you drive a car, you are in control of a multi-ton <em>lethal weapon</em>. You can kill innocent people if you screw up badly enough. I feel pretty strongly that someone who doesn’t understand the significance of the responsibility that they’re taking on when they drive, is not mature enough to be driving, no matter how old they are. </p>
<p>And the fact that the other kids I knew (and many adults that I knew, for that matter) mostly just saw the idea of driving as an exciting adventure, with little consideration of the tremendous responsibility that is operating a vehicle, certainly put me off learning. “I’d have to share the road with these people? With a bunch of irresponsible thrill-seekers? No thanks.” Of course, the joke’s kind of on me there, since now I’m learning to drive in <em>Boston</em>. ;)</p>
<p>I grew up in an area with poor public transit, but I also lived in the neighborhood with most of the cultural attractions, and I was in good shape. I <em>walked</em> places. And once I got up to metro Boston for college, well, the combination of lunatic drivers and good public transit was a tremendous disincentive to learn. It’s only now that I’ve gotten into activities where I’m finding not driving a serious inconvenience.</p>
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<p>Why should it be difficult? In college, I dated a guy without a car. We walked places, or occasionally took public transit if necessary.</p>
<p>Similar situation here, except that I did end up taking the behind-the-wheel portion at my school and that, along with only a very small amount of additional behind-the-wheel practice with my father in his car, was all that I had before I got my license back in the 70s.</p>
<p>I’m in PA, with a 50 hour practice requirement for license applicants (under 18, I think…?). I don’t have a problem with requiring a certain number of hours of behind-the-wheel practice, but as mentioned in post #18 above, both school based and commercial driving school lessons are quite expensive and normally cover only about 6 hours. Personally I’d have preferred my kids (because both of them were/are reluctant drivers) to have closer to around 20 hours of practice in a “dual-brake” vehicle before practicing behind the wheel in a regular car, to build up their comfort and confidence.</p>
<p>As I mentioned, D1 didn’t want to learn how to drive, but reluctantly did so. She had her permit for over a year, and then finally got her license about 2 weeks before leaving for college. She goes to school in a major city with an extensive public transit system, so she only drives a car, when she’s back home, mainly to destination in and around our town. D2 got her permit last summer, but still doesn’t have nearly the amount of practice hours that she needs to get her license and she isn’t eager to practice. But, like her older sister, H and I really want her to get her license before she leaves for college, in which case, the practice and driving exam logistics will become that much tougher.</p>
<p>I don’t think having a license will make much of a difference on college choices, as almost all have on campus housing available. And even off campus housing most places there are buses or shuttles catering to getting students onto campus. (Though I remember I didn’t need a car at college until my job was driving those buses…) My daughter found her choice of internships and jobs limited unless she brought her car to school, as some of the better choices were off campus, and time considerations meant public transportation was not an option. I would imagine this would not be a problem in NYC or Boston or other large cities with good public transportation, but LA, it’s a problem.</p>
<p>As mentioned above, drivers ed (classroom) is a grad requirement at our public HS, but they also offer free ten hours of on-the-road driving with the drivers ed teachers. It’s pretty rare these days in other districts but it’s been so popular here with parents and students that I don’t think they will do away with it.</p>
<p>Between my three kids, I’ve probably visited two dozen colleges. There would be little problem not having a car with a big city college but even the small city’s around here don’t have great public transportation - and not something that would work if you lived off campus and wanted to go back and forth to your apartment between classes. Huge colleges maybe somehow work that out and you might be fine for your first two years. But how does one do without a car as a junior and senior if there is no public transportation and you live over a mile from your campus? Here in the Northeast we have bad weather where you hardly want to get out of your house let alone walk or bike a mile or two. Of the colleges we’ve visited, I can only think of a couple where being car-less for four years would work and even then an internship would make that pretty difficult.</p>
<p>We have an after school drivers ed program at my high school, but for some reason we didn’t use it, most people don’t. We have a privately run driving academy a block from my house that is operated by state troopers, that’s where my friends and I learned to drive. It was probably $300-$500 for the program. I don’t think I’d trade that time for anything just because it was so cool and so enlightening to spend that much time with police officers, that straightens a kid out. If memory serves we had 24 hours of class time, 6 hours of driving with an instructor (who was an officer), and a written test to get our permit. 50 hours of driving with a parent later we could come back for segment 2 of classes, and upon completing that we could schedule our road test for our license. It was really hard to fit in time for the classes, but that’s just the way it is around here. If you want your license, you make it a priority. The program runs all year round and there is no reason not to take it in the summer if your ECs during school are too extensive.</p>
<p>Once you’re 18, though, you can get an adult permit with none of the song and dance and 30 days later can take the road test. Some of my friends have opted to do that. That would have left me with one chance to take the road test before I needed to start driving to school, and my mom wanted me to know how to drive so I could do so in an emergency.</p>
<p>My kids both took driver’s ed at the local public HS (even tho they were attending a private HS). The cost was $10 for the entire classroom 6-week course as well as 4 hours behind-the-wheel hours with an instructor. If they did it via private instructor, I believe it would have been about $650 or so.</p>
<p>There is HEAVY traffic in our city (nearly 24/7), so driving takes great effort. Both of my kids did not have the stamina to drive in HS. S drives a bit now in LA, mainly to get groceries & now to go to job interviews as well. They both see driving as a necessary task, not something they relish. D still has to have some more hours of practice before she goes for her road test, perhaps this summer at age 20. She has rarely driven since she was attending CC–generally doesn’t have the energy & concentrentration to devote to it.</p>
If memory serves we had 24 hours of class time, 6 hours of driving with an instructor (who was an officer), and a written test to get our permit. 50 hours of driving with a parent later we could come back for segment 2 of classes, and upon completing that we could schedule our road test for our license. It was really hard to fit in time for the classes, but that’s just the way it is around here. If you want your license, you make it a priority. The program runs all year round and there is no reason not to take it in the summer if your ECs during school are too extensive.</p>