On Tue, 6 Apr 2021 16:48:21 +0100, "NY" wrote:

snip

It was the only way I could use something motorised when I was 16. ;-)

I started learning to drive, in a combination of my mum's car (Renault 6)
and an instructor's car (Honda Civic), as soon as I turned 17.

I also started soon after my 17th but only in my instructors Triumph
Toledo. Dad had a company car at the time so I never thought to ask if
I could drive that and there was no thought / mention of him
instructing me. I did however used to steer the car up private roads
when very young and sitting in his lap but not that often.

I passed my
test (third attempt) shortly after my 18th birthday in 1981 (I failed the
second (*) time on my 18th - and the examiner commiserated that he wasn't
able to give me a pass certificate for my birthday!).

I passed mine first time but my instructor was a real stickler for
detail and I had a good few lessons (because of that). His idea was
'If I can make you twice as good as you need to be and you are only
half as good as you need to be on the day ...'. Sounded good in
theory. ;-)

I passed my bike test the first time as well but it was very different
in those days. ;-)

But after that, apart
from driving mum's or dad's cars occasionally when we went on journeys, I
didn't drive much until my last year at university when I bought myself a
car because my final-year hall of residence was not on a bus route and was a
long way from the site where I was based.

And that, your situation / location can make a big difference to how
soon you 1) learn to drive and get a licence and 2) then get a bike /
car.

Like a mate always lived in inner London where parking a car was
difficult so he always used public transport.

Even though daughter didn't want to drive a car, we advised her to
take her test asap as having a (car particularly) license can be
another tick box when applying for a job. As it happened it did and
has and does drive all sorts of stuff (cars , trucks, vans) in her
current role. She's also pretty handy in a JCB 4CX backhoe digger
(under supervision on private property).

Until then, I walked between hall
and university, apart from occasional rainy days when I got the bus. I think
the majority of people walked or cycled: a few had hand-me-down cars and a
smaller number had motorbikes (yes, surprising that there were fewer with
motorbikes than cars).

Yeah, I think there are places where some vehicles are better than
other. Like if the only easy access to a place involves a long trip or
getting though a width restriction (excluding cars etc).

My only two wheeler commute (to BT) was on my Lambretta SX150 and that
was much more predictable than the car / van because you could
*always* get over the railway crossing per each opening. ;-)

But I think I could walk up the very non-PC Blackboy
Hill quicker than my mate's Honda 50 moped could manage it ;-)

Yeah, it's quite surprising just how many vehicles that are ok on the
flat (given time) struggle up a hill.


(*) I don't really count the first failure because I drew the short straw
and got "Mr Hemlock" who very rarely passed anyone. My instructor said
almost none of his pupils passed with Mr H, whereas roughly the same
proportion passed with all the other examiners.

Yeah, that does happen as there is some discretion involved (or was
then).

The only person I know who
passed was my next door neighbour who was in her 70s when she had to learn
(or re-learn) to drive after her husband became too ill to drive. Mr H said
"I am very sorry to have to tell you that I cannot find sufficient grounds
to fail you, so I obliged against my better judgement to pass you."

;-)

Apparently he was moved every few years from one test centre to another in
the Home Counties because he kept failing far more than the normal quota and
was obnoxious to "the public". I imagine if he kept that up, he would have
been disciplined at an "examiner's examination". On my test he gave me an
ambiguous instruction which I asked him to clarify "do you mean turn left
into X street or Y street" and he accused me of showing off my local
knowledge of street names,

He he. My Mrs did similar on her bike test when the examiner (over the
intercom) told her to turn second left whilst counting a shop access
road (that led back onto the road). He couldn't fail her on that as it
wasn't a fault as such.

and on another occasion when I asked him whether
he would want me to turn left or go straight on at a junction some distance
ahead, so I could get into the correct lane in plenty of time, he blew his
top.

Oh!

When he did eventually tell me, I had to indicate far too late and got
hooted at for pushing in, so I explained *that* was why I'd asked several
hundred yards further back. So that wasn't a realistic fair test.

A mate taking his HGV test was asked to 'pull over here' and he
didn't. The examiner said it again and he didn't, but pulled up a bit
further on.

The examiner asked why he hadn't pulled up when first asked and my
mate said that he, the driver, didn't feel it was safe to do so. The
examiner accepted his answer but just countered that he considered it
safe but wasn't the one driving the vehicle at that time (so had
something bad happened, it would have been my mate, not him who might
have been in trouble).

A trick some say you can / should do on bike tests (where the examiner
follows you on another bike or sometimes a car) is to not filter past
stationary traffic, even though you might normally as that opens up
more opportunities for things to go wrong and more time to do more
stuff with the same risk). ;-)

Cheers, T i m