Glad I'm not 17 anymore

[Partridge]

They should all be like me and buy a Rover 820 Sterling when you're 21. It aged me by 65 years and can be out-dragged by iceburgs. Problem solved.

[warren t claim]

Is deffo give anything to be 17 again knowing what I know now.

[trigger]

I'd be like a sex god if I was 17 knowing what I know about women now!

[Lacquer Peel]

Are you trying to say you're a sex god now?

 

 

The last thing we need is more red tape, especially against young adults. These articles really get my back up. Why do they think raising the driving age by one year is going to make any difference? Or stupid curfews. If anything, driver training should be taught from 16, like in the US with their "driver ed", ideally with an off road element. And then by 17 you can pass the test and get a licence, job done. End of the day I passed the IAM test and never drove like a lunatic a few years ago when I was a teenager, I was too worried about my car to risk bashing it. If someone wants to be stupid they will.

 

Yes, be more like the US, where driving standards are piss poor.

[trigger]

I wish.

[brownnova]

The only car accident I've ever had was when I was 17...

 

My fault, overconfident, under-experienced.

 

Which describes the vast majority of 17 year olds drivers. Working with 17 year olds and listening to what they say about driving it makes me think that raising the age might not be a bad thing!! So many of them have had accidents already it beggars belief!

[Lacquer Peel]

Inexperience is inexperience whether you're 17 or 27.

[Skizzer]

This thread will be old enough to pass its test soon.

[John F]

The last thing we need is more red tape, especially against young adults. These articles really get my back up. Why do they think raising the driving age by one year is going to make any difference? Or stupid curfews. If anything, driver training should be taught from 16, like in the US with their "driver ed", ideally with an off road element. And then by 17 you can pass the test and get a licence, job done. End of the day I passed the IAM test and never drove like a lunatic a few years ago when I was a teenager, I was too worried about my car to risk bashing it. If someone wants to be stupid they will.

 

Yeah, great idea - let's allow even more immature drivers on our already-overcrowded roads.

 

Seriously, mate - if you think things in america are so great why don't you just go and live there?

[J-Rod]

Utter wank, the only people who will benefit are the driving instructors and the government. Plus you'll end up with more unlicensed drivers.

 

You'd be better incorporating more focus on maturity and intelligence / common sense into the testing.

 

In my mind nobody learns to drive, they learn to pass the test, it's only after passing the test you truly start learning.

This. I drove like a tool when I had my first car, not that long after I passed my test as I was simply taught how to pass the test. How I didn't end up in more (any) scrapes is anyone's guess. However, a few months after getting it I started University, which necessitated a 1 hour journey up the A465 in the morning and back in the evening most days. That learned me. 

 

I would have thought that it would be more prudent to include such things as 'basic car maintenance', instead of the (in my mind) daft hazard perception test (which sounds like something a committee might come up with). Sure, you might see the kid run out in front of you in the rain but with practically bald fronts, you might not be able to stop for them. Take pride in your motor and the rest will surely follow? Well, in theory anyway..!! 

[Guest Flynn]

The only car accident I've ever had was when I was 17...

 

My fault, overconfident, under-experienced.

 

Which describes the vast majority of 17 year olds drivers. Working with 17 year olds and listening to what they say about driving it makes me think that raising the age might not be a bad thing!! So many of them have had accidents already it beggars belief!

Let's be honest, the driving age is "technically" 17, but, let's be honest, how many people can actually afford the costs a car brings at 17? I passed when I was 18, didn't have money to buy a car until I was 19. I should imagine the same is true of most people, unless their parents buy them a car. Or unless you are lucky enough to get a job on your 17th birthday I can't see how you would have enough time to be on the road when you were 17, realistically the earliest for most people is 18-19 anyway.

 

Yeah, great idea - let's allow even more immature drivers on our already-overcrowded roads.

 

Seriously, mate - if you think things in america are so great why don't you just go and live there?

 

How will it allow more immature drivers? I suggested starting a "drivers ed" style program for youths when they are 16 so by 17 they will already have a basic theory of what driving is about. I don't see how adding education will lead to more immature drivers.

 

 

This. I drove like a tool when I had my first car, not that long after I passed my test as I was simply taught how to pass the test. How I didn't end up in more (any) scrapes is anyone's guess. However, a few months after getting it I started University, which necessitated a 1 hour journey up the A465 in the morning and back in the evening most days. That learned me. 

 

I would have thought that it would be more prudent to include such things as 'basic car maintenance', instead of the (in my mind) daft hazard perception test (which sounds like something a committee might come up with). Sure, you might see the kid run out in front of you in the rain but with practically bald fronts, you might not be able to stop for them. Take pride in your motor and the rest will surely follow? Well, in theory anyway..!! 

 

I agree, I always took pride in my motor and often I found that I was very weary of what could happen. Not only that but insurance as well, I worked a 7 hour per week bullshit arse cleaning job to pay the insurance. With some help from my parents when necessary. How you acquire the car and how you pay the up keep has a lot to do with it. Also I never had a "driving like a tool" stage myself, as a result of the struggle to keep it on the road.

[Skizzer]

Bored of this now.  Let's talk about shitty old cars instead.

[purplebargeken]

Can we just take off all o f the shite such as PAS, ABS, airbags, ESP, auto braking and lane wandering alerts and so on. Lets see what happens. People might actually learn to drive instead of relying on technology to keep them out of the shit. They may also die. 

[PiperCub]

Was always thus - it doesn't matter what age is a minimum, there will always be dimwits out there who are going to wreck it for everyone else. This 'raise-the-age' arguement has been around since at least the 1970's from my recollection and probably before that I'd not be surprised.

 

A graduated scheme might be an idea but it's just be another admin exercise in my opinion as the cost of insurance tends to limit many youngsters (unless bankrolled by daddy & mummy). I do think driver-ed or whatever you want to call it should be on the school cirriculum though, this would be a good start and try to get them on-side when they are young.

 

When I was 17, I was a shite driver too - weren't we all if we're honest, I got by because I couldn't afford to trash my car (£85 Mini 1000 FYI!) on TPFT insurance as I'd not be able to afford to get another. With most of us at the time (early 80's), it was a case of you-break-it-you-fix-it-yourself as we didn't have the money for anything else. Plus we weren't reliant on driver-aids as nowadays which most people not just the young seem to think will always get them out of trouble so maybe we learned about car control quicker? Hard to say how much this applies. Doing my IAM test quite young also helped as did learning to ride a bike when I was 19, both taught me much about driving/road use. I think the IAM (& RoSPA) tests ahould be pushed more too.

 

Overall, the only suggestion/improvement(?) I can come up with is to adopt a more structured process of obtaining a driving licence (which would be more £££ of course!) in the same way you earn a pilots licence, certain things need to be achieved in a certain order and checked off, there's no waving-through. Whether this would work in the real world or not is open to question, it's just a personal view.

[sierraman]

You used to be able to beat the system in a way by having something unlikely like a Rover 418SD, as so few were written off, the likelihood of a claim meant you paid bugger all. If you picked a Nova for example you would have been severely bummed. Im not sure it works like that now, you get stuffed even if you have a Daihatsu Sirion for 2 grand.

[motormatt]

I did hear about a case of a 21 year old who killed a lass and gravely injured two others in a head on a couple of years ago, the fact that he managed to lie about his age to get covered on a Focus ST and that he was smacked off his tits and doing 130+ In a 60 limit just shows that no matter how much they charge, how much education people are given, dickheads are still gonna be dickheads on the roads.

[Minimad5]

Yes young drivers lack the experience & seem to have rather too much convidence when driving, BUT on my daily drive i have actually noticed 'Da Youff' are not as bad the middle aged angry repmobile drivers who sit at ten-thou' from your bumper and proceed to get more angry, as you are unable to move aside and let them past.

And the elderly,to which i have had to increasingly watch out for ....

Pulling out with clearly not enough room (thanks for that, caused me to have my first accident)

And a number of near misses i have recently either witnessed or had myself, all include older people in which the best one being a tootling (45mph) BMW 1 series on the motorway, suddenly swooping over two lanes with no indication or care for the world, causing an wagon and mercedes sprinter to produce some alarming noises and the latter tyre smoke on lock-up to avoid the fool.

 

I'm not saying the figures are false (papers or government never lie!!) , and i agree some sort of checks should be made for both new and young drivers, but how far do you go ?

As the for ever targeted age range, will simply move onto motorbikes - to which they will have to clamp down on them too.

 

Rather funny reading some comments on here though, thinking 'pretty sure you've driven like a div once or twice too'.

[fred]

I think its Time related, drive anywhere at 8.00 AM and everyone is a cunt, 10AM its all gawn friendly again. 3.30 onwards pm back to being cunts again. Unless Your in Brum, London etc,, and they are all cunts 24/7

[burraston2006]

The best bit of advise my driving instructor give me was: 'Always drive like there's a twat like you coming the other way!' Seems to have worked as I've not had a major bump in 20+ years. He also came around my home after I passed to give me a major bollocking for my driving as it was giving him a bad name!! Decent gent. Shame he is no longer with us!

[gordonbennet]

As mentioned several times, modern cars (and cars 10 years old are modern to us) are not just fast but they usually handle and stop fantastically well.

 

I had relatively fast cars in my youth, cos i earned relatively good money for working class nobody, but universally whilst some of those cars were powerful they all required some respect to stop them or keep them on the road in anything other than perfect conditions.

This meant that we had our scares at recoverably slow speeds, or we ended up whacking kerbs etc sideways which fucked our suspensions and we ended up knee deep in shit down the scrappy getting bits off and then doing the same to our own heaps lying on the wet gravel dismantling bastards.

We soon learned to drive them.

 

Problem now is that most cars will drive themselves for you, and this has increased the point where physics takes over and when it all goes to pieces its at a much higher speed.

 

I too am a lorry driver(ish), and lorries have gone exactly the same way, a chimp could drive a modern lorry now cos literally all you have to do is steer it, and we see the results every day in lorry world.

 

Yesterday, Friday, i had a really early regular run up to Northwich...left the yard at just before 4am and had a nice steady 51 mph cruise all the way and stopped for 20 mins before delivery point to have a cuppa and piss before i get there and do me job.

 

Once i got past Brum the lorry crush started, fuck me they put the fear of Christ up you, i'm in the inside lane doing about 50 or so keeping a normal (three or 4 artic length) distance from the lorries in front doing that some speed...but the middle lane was nose to tail lorries doing their limited 55 but with travelling distances of between a car and bus length between them...what these twats think is going to happen if there's a panic stop i'm buggered if i know but each and every one of these bods thinks they are a professional cos some twat taught em on a simple as van be lorry and some other bod passed em and thats where the learning ended.

No doubt there'll be some of them killed over the next few weeks for the above reasons (though often enough its the innocent other who's killed) and the truckers forum will be thick with rest in peace drive and other such platitudes when its cuntishness that invariably kills and maims people.

Trouble is in lorry world, just as in cars, we've dumbed the job down to the point of lowest common denominator, we're getting more and more electric *** shit *** and as Junkmans pertinent posts point out nowhere does using ones brain feature anywhere.

One cunt in a rigid who won't be around for long was so close to the arse of the lorry in front ( dozens in front of him so going nowhere) that he could even make out where he was on the road and was swaying into both the inside and outside lanes constantly...if a copper wanted to see for themselves they could jump in and come with me on that run, i bet they don't see half of it.

 

***oddly enough some of the electronics are going to save their own and others lives, increasingly lorries are being fitted with adaptive cruise control and linked to auto braking will stop these twats tailgating, and before too long lorries will be increasingly restricted to the inside lane only,  course lorry drivers are up in arms about it all but many are too thick to see that its they themselves who are causing of it.

[cort16]

I recon a lot of accidents are caused by young lads with DSL (dangerous spunk levels) showing off to girls trying to get their nat king cole. Therefore I think a 12 month course of bromide tablets should be mandatory after passing the test .