Tell me what you think about this situation:
I am going to visit friends at SUNY New Paltz. My mom is all for me going to visit but she doesn’t want me to drive there on my own unless a friend comes with me, but the friend who was supposed to go ended up cancelling on me. So now i have to take the bus.
I was really looking forward to driving up there and taking a little road trip, so i’m really bummed about not being able to do that.
Ive had my license for about 3 months now, but my mom, as well as myself, think i am a very good driver. I havent gotten in any accidents and i always do my best to be safe on the road.
I asked my mom if she would still let me drive there even though my friend can’t come, and she said no. I understand her reasoning that the roads are dangerous and i should have a copilot but i have seen how the roads are and i think i can handle it. I also won’t be driving at night, all the driving i will be doing will be in the daytime. Ive been to New Paltz three times already and although i wasnt driving, I know where I need to go and i will have a GPS as well as written directions. I know never to text and drive and will always pull over if i need to contact someone or look over directions. I am very safe and responsible.
I really want to take this trip on my own and not take the bus. I like knowing that everything i need is in my vehicle when i need it and i just feel that i will be 10x more comfortable and happy if i drove there than if i took the bus. I was looking forward to this little adventure and I think if my mom would let me drive with a friend, i should be able to drive on my own. I feel i would be more stressed if i had a friend in the car to be completely honest. Its just more distracting in my opinion.
What do you parents think of my situation? Do you think its reasonable for me to drive myself and i should try to convince her to let me or should i just take the bus?
Ill take the bus if i have to but i would just feel a lot better driving. The trip would take about 2 hours by the way, and ive already driven about an hour straight before.
Your mom is right. I would be very surprised you get any responses from any parent who would feel differently given that you have only had your license for 3 months. There is a big difference between a “very good” new driver and an experienced driver.
You have 3 choices: (1) Take the bus, (2) Find another friend to come with you to New Palz, or (3) Reschedule your trip for a time that a friend came come.
I see you are on the Island. So am I. I took my D to see New Paltz 10 years ago and the drive scared me and I have had a license for almost 40 years at this point. Honestly, I wouldn’t even let you drive up with a friend if you were my child. I didn’t let my D drive to school (she went to Plattsburgh) until her last year and I never let her brother drive up or down alone. My current senior is looking at Fredonia and when we go up there, my sons who are in their 20’s are coming along to drive. I doubt I will let S17, who has had his license for 6 months, drive at all.
Take the bus and see how you feel about doing that as a student.
As an aside, the kids I know who have gone to New Paltz have really liked it, but my D got a bad vibe and refused to attend.
What is scary about this drive? The LIE, 295 and having to go over a few bridges?
With GPS/Waze also makes it easier for someone unfamiliar with the route since it tells you before hand what is coming up.
@techmom99, your trip with your son to Fredonia is the perfect time to get him used to driving on highway/thruway. Not letting him drive at all makes no sense to me whatsoever.
I see you joined our forum to ask this question of parents. Finding a parent forum to ask for advice shows initiative.
That being said, I’d like to know how long this road trip would be. When I see the phrase “road trip”, I think of hours and hours of driving. We recently volunteered to accompany our almost 22 year old daughter on a 420 mile drive across three states, because we knew how grueling driving 7 hours by yourself can be.
I agree with calmom and the three choices you have.
P.S. Not getting in any accidents for three months is not a record. 
Add me to the chorus. Having your driver’s license for three months is not going to win my vote for a road trip. TBH! I would not have allowed our kids to drive someone else on a road trip either.
In our state new driver’s can NOT have passengers for the first six months after getting the driver’s license.
I made a lot of cross-country trips when I was a young driver. The difference? By the time I graduated HS, I had been driving for 4 years. Those trips started after 4 years of driving with no issues. Pilots have to have a certain number of hours in the air to be qualified for various ratings. 3 months behind the wheel would not be enough if you spent all of your waking hours driving. You have not even experienced driving in all 4 seasons.
I heartily endorse road trips. Better when done by a couple of people, but I enjoyed my solo trips as well. Get another 3+ years of local experience. Slowly widen your range from familiar local roads to far away places. Even another driver does not help when you have too little practice (unless the other driver is highly experienced).
Mom is right on this one. Great idea, just not yet.
Oh my…I have always been that parent who imagines the worst case scenario when it comes to my kid’s driving. I wouldn’t have allowed it and didn’t when my middle child wanted to drive up to her friend’s college in the summer between graduation and college.
I learned to drive the summer after I graduated from college and two months later a friend of mine and I bought a camper van and drove across the country. My partner had had a license for longer, but she was a dreadful driver. We survived, though I did once back into someone’s mailbox and I had a near miss when I got distracted by an extra passenger. So part of me is saying no you don’t have enough experience and part of me is saying you’d probably be fine. It really depends on how much highway driving you’ve done. I don’t think you are necessarily safer with a passenger - most studies show that young people are less safe with company in the car.
It also might depend on the highways. If you are going to be on 95 north of Portland Maine where there is VERY little traffic, that’s a little different than being on 95 between Boston and D.C.
But another question…maybe I missed this. Where are you staying? If you are 17 and 18 and need to stay on a hotel for any reason along the way…the answer might be no. Ditto many campgrounds.
@thumper1 - she says she is going to SUNY New Palz and apparently lives on Long Island - she also wrote that it is about a 2 hour drive - though I think it’s more like 3 hours. So she’s going from Long Island to a campus near Poughkeepsie - Hudson valley, what my Brooklyn-dwelling daughter calls “upstate”.
I don’t think the issue is whether or not she could manage the drive safely. I think it’s a matter of whether her mom’s restriction is reasonable. Obviously, the odds are that if she did the drive, things would go ok – it’s just that she has only been licensed for 3 months, and her mom isn’t comfortable with her doing that trip alone. So the question isn’t whether it is possible for her to complete the drive safely on her own, it is whether in view of her age and degree of experience, whether her mom is right to insist that she have someone with her this time around.
I think most parents would feel that way, for good reason. I would agree with the mom. I did allow my daughter to take some longer road trips when she was in high school, but she had been driving a lot longer than 3 months when I did, and she always, always had someone with her on any of the longer trips. It’s not just a matter of worrying about an accident - it’s also the possibility of car trouble that could leave her stranded on the side of the road. And an accident that is someone else’s fault is just as much an accident as one caused by an inexperienced driver.
Plus she obviously was planning the trip very soon, which by definition is winter driving. Certainly there is no guarantee of clear skies and a dry road.
OP hasn’t come back – I am sure she was naively thinking that she was looking for a chorus of responses from parents to support an argument with her mom, as general variation of the “so-and-so’s parents allow X” argument that kids somehow think will work.
As adults we can debate the relative safety of those NY parkways & espressways and probably have different view points. As a Californian I’ve always found driving anywhere in NY relatively scary – but again,that’s really not the issue. If a high school kid were to post here griping about the parent’s setting a 1am curfew I’d have the same response – and I never set any curfews at all for my kids. It’s not that some other parent might come to some other decision – it’s simply that the OP’s mom has set forth a perfectly reasonable restriction that if anything is probably more lenient than most parents would require.
H and I are pretty inexperienced with winter driving and rather nervous about any of it where it could be foggy, snowy, or icy. I’d not want a young person who doesn’t have much experience in driving in winter weather on a several hour road trip solo, for her protection and that of others on the road.
Get over it and take the bus.
When is this road trip? If is to orrow, there is snow in the forecast for some of the area.
I’m with this mom, and apparently so is my state. You cannot have a passenger in your car when you have just had a license for three months…unless that person is over 21 and has had a license for over 3 years.
I agree with the poster above. Just take the bus…and leave the driving to them. Really, you can relax both ways…and lots of buses now are equipped with Wifi.
Actually, my state also has rules about new drivers and passengers - for a much longer period (12 months).
@longislandski
I have daughters that are older than you, and they always ask me to drive, when they want to meet friends, out of town. I do my own thing and read/lounge around a nice hotel and they get rides.
You’ve been driving for 3 whole months! Great!
But, driving on your own, you cannot predict what will happen on the roads, black ice, fog, storm, nothing that will prepare you, regardless of having 90 days of not getting a ticket.
You are not 18 yet, correct? If you need car maintenance, you can’t sign a contract. Auto club just picks you up and drives you to the nearest repair shop, but you can’t do anything until Mom and Dad come to get you.
Learn to take the bus, or wait for a more convenient time.
California also does not allow new drivers, under the age of 18, to drive with another person until they have had 1 year of driving experience. They also can’t drive with anyone under the age of 20, and between curfew hours of 11 pm to 5 am. How does that sit with you?