It's still a thing these days. For years I was pressured into getting a driving permit but hated the roads so delayed it. Just got it, it was exciting for a month (mastering the physics of the vehicle mostly), now I'm free to .. get food at the mall [2]. I tell this to people, and they're "NOoooo you're independent, you can do anything" with shiny eyes.
[1] angry drivers, jam, not green, enjoyed walking, running, biking..
[2] also it's incredibly stressful to me. I'm constantly checking everything (and that doesn't even save from bumping into cars because I can't scan 360deg in parallel).
When I read about people not wanting to get a driver's license, my mind boggles. It's not about owning a car. For me, that's primarily a decision about economics and the advantages of having a personalized space. It's not about my routine day-to-day travel requirements although I do indeed require a car for that.
Rather, it's about experiences going into the mountains/deserts/forests that require driving. Sure, I could wait for opportunities when I can piggyback on someone else but who wants to have that sort of dependency?
I don't pilot the planes I fly on - and I extend that exact logic to cars/trains/ferries/boats and ALL other transportation. This applies especially planes and domesticated transportation like camels and elephants. I've haven't had the need to ride a llama/alpaca (yet), but it would apply to them as well if the situation came up. Bicycles, 1-man canoes, and horses are really my only exceptions for obvious reasons.
You really can't take your car heliskiing. And you still need a bush pilot in most of the semi-remote world to get around.
I take your point but, for most people, there's a lot of ground between hiring a helicopter to go heliskiing and being dependent on whatever public transportation happens to be available. Clearly we have different lifestyles. Even leaving aside that I couldn't easily work at my current job without a car, I'd have to give up a significant subset of my recreational and travel activities.
I have never been to US national park, but I've visited some in Eastern Europe and Scotland. I can't imagine myself traveling over 4 thousand miles by any other transportation (trains, buses, bicycles, walking) within given timeframe, budget and convenience. Now this is the "old world", where you travel 500 miles and find yourself in an another country; I can only imagine what traveling in the US feels like. Maybe, one day, I will know - one can always hope...
It also used to be about retaining mobility once you get old.
When you can't run around outside for more than a few minutes and can't ride a bike any more, a car becomes you sole connection to the physical world.
Today, I'd say it is more of a bet: "How certain am I that the 100% self-driving car revolution (as in: needs no license) will reach the place I live in before I get old?"
> also it's incredibly stressful to me. I'm constantly checking everything (and that doesn't even save from bumping into cars because I can't scan 360deg in parallel).
This goes away after a while. Studies have shown that new drivers try to focus on everything, while experienced drivers only focus on key points.
As a result, experienced drivers get in less accidents.
Basically you get a sixth sense for driving. But you need a big corpus of data for that.
Indeed, In a few months you see how your brain optimizes information seeking and synchronization. Now a quick glance n mirrors is enough to know presence and distance. Before that I'd have to look at the thing like painting. I don't trust my 6th sense though, I often drop too fast too deep in the confident state.
Maybe so, but there's still the stress of being in rush hour, gridlocked traffic. That's never gone away for me, which is why I'm thankful not to have a commute that requires it.
[1] angry drivers, jam, not green, enjoyed walking, running, biking..
[2] also it's incredibly stressful to me. I'm constantly checking everything (and that doesn't even save from bumping into cars because I can't scan 360deg in parallel).