Teens – No Driver’s License and No Car! Maybe Ever!

Getting my driver’s license was one of my early teenage rites of passage. I couldn't wait for so many reasons and it was a big day when it finally happened. As is natural in most passage experiences, there were real trials on the path to getting my license. First, I had to study the arcane details that make up the “rules of the road” to get my permit. And then came the many tests of my ability such as staying in a lane, observing pedestrians, making full stops, obeying the speed limit, and the dreaded parallel parking. But it was all worth it to get the license and become a legal driver.

For me, it was not just that I could be in charge of 2000 pounds of steel and fly down the road, but much more. Driving meant escape from the pressure cooker of our small family house and all its tensions. It meant I had status among my non-driving pals and could easily pull them together for common adventures. I could often drive to school, rising above the demeaning wait and riding on the school bus. It meant I had a new and private space for hanging out with girls and that new world of emerging sexuality. Very simply stated, a driver’s license made my world much bigger geographically and opened countless doors of discovery.

...it was a golden chariot to me.

I quickly grew attached to all the excitement and possibilities of having access to a car, and it wasn’t long before I wanted my own. My first car was a beat up, black, 57 Volkswagen. The seats were badly worn, it often smelled like gas, the windshield wipers were hardly functional, it had dings and rust on the body, and it barely had enough heat in the winter to keep the windows defrosted much less provide any comfort. But it was a golden chariot to me. That’s why I was surprised to learn that for many young people, getting a driver’s license today, much less a car is NOT the exciting rite of passage it was for me.

. . . getting a driver’s license today is NOT
the exciting rite of passage it was for me.

In 2019, StudentMoveTO, a research partnership of ten colleges and universities in Canada, surveyed 18,500 students at ten post-secondary institutions across the Toronto and Hamilton area. They discovered More than twenty-two per cent of survey respondents said they didn’t have a driver’s license. The group’s research also found that sixty-five per cent of students who did have a driver’s license didn’t own a car, and of those, just fifteen per cent indicated they would buy a car in the future. So much for golden chariots!

Some of the reasons given for avoiding car ownership and driving included good access to public transit services (83 per cent), all the costs associated with driving and owning a car (66 per cent), and the negative impacts of driving on the environment (50 per cent).

When you realize that with a few taps on your smartphone you can call up Uber and Lyft and quickly go where every you like without paying car insurance, parking, maintenance, and car repairs, it does make sense. Not to mention the availability of electric scooters and bikes appearing everywhere in major cities.

You can read more about this topic in a recent article in the Toronto Star or on the website of StudentMoveTO.

I do get the world is changing, and less driving for all of us is really a good thing. But sitting here in this moment, I do miss my golden chariot, and all the trials and joys that came with it.

Do you remember your first "golden chariot?

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