U.S. drivers license | Page 3 | INFJ Forum

U.S. drivers license

Only way to get better drivers is to hit them in the pocket. I speed, and here there are practically no fines. If there were, I wouldn't.
 
Only way to get better drivers is to hit them in the pocket. I speed, and here there are practically no fines. If there were, I wouldn't.

They fine us big over here in Florida 300$ a pop, hasn't stoped people though. They just choose to not pay the ticket lose there license and keep on driving.
 
I do indeed have my license, and yes I know that the DMV is the pinnacle of state and federal beauracracy, I had a run in with them just the other day as my mom tried to get a new copy of her license after her's was stolen.

However my was incredibly simple, took a class in highschool, got paper from my teacher handed it to the folks at the DMV and got my picture taken. Took less then an hour for the whole process.

Streamline the whole thing and people could be in and out in an hour.

Not in utah. You have to have 6 hours of with instructor driving, 6 months of holding a permit, take a driver's education class and on top of all that the lines at the DMV take 3 hours to get through. if you do not have a birth certificate, 2 pieces of make and 3 other forms of identification including a social security number, the originals, not copies, then they will make you come back. Due to all of this, it took me one year and seven months from the time i got my permit to get the license.
 
Where I live, it's done the same way as in Cally -- in addition there is a 'safe driver recognition' program that gives you 1 point per year without at-fault collisions (if the driver is rated in the positives, then its 2% discount per point on vehicle registration -- and each point in the negatives costs $50 penalty per negative score on licence renewals). I got into a minor accident (-4 points) several months ago so went from +2 to -2 which means I owe my DMV $100, and in 2 years time driver record will be 0 working its way into the postives and i'll start getting a discount. In addition, I had to take a defensive driving course. Which is reasonable considering the DMV thinks I was at fault. I think this is the best way to go about it.

In addition, I think people should have to retake a vision and driving test every 10 years, every year is too much hassle.
 
Barnabus, I empathize. I live in Florida too. When I first moved here, several people told me that it was not a matter of whether I would have an accident, only when, and how bad. I had a perfect record before, but within 4 yrs. of moving here, I'd been in two very serious accidents, one in which I was even declared dead on the scene! This resulted in permanent brain damage for me, and a broken nose for the woman who hit me. This gloomy prognosis is due to several things, IMO.

First, Florida has more roads than any other state that get an "F" grade. This is due to way, way, way more vehicles on our roads than the roads were designed to handle. This means you must deal with massive amts. of info and pay attention at all times, but people don't. Instead they are texting, talking on cells, eating, etc. I guess people who've not been through what I have, don't respect what two tons of steel can do to flesh and blood.

For decades, people have been moving to this state at the rate of about 1,500 people per day, clogging the roads way more than anywhere else I've lived, and I've lived in 8 states. That has recently changed, since we have the worst unemployment and the highest foreclosure rates in the nation, making us the top state in the "recession". Here in Florida, it's a depression. In my husband's field of work, for example, the unemployment rate is 24%, and he has had to take a huge pay cut and work 6 days a week to make less than he made before. People are still coming here, though not as many, but now 90% of our new residents are illegals, who do not bother to get licenses.

Though I think this will change now, due to the economy, we have a lot of old people who retired here, where they have no family to take care of them. Then they are forced to drive because public transportation is a virtually non-existent joke. You can't walk anywhere here, because it was all developed after the age of the car, and is spread way out. There are few sidewalks or road shoulders, and if you do risk walking,(we have the highest pedestrian and bicycle death rates in the nation) you will get heatstroke and/or arrive soaking wet with sweat.

Alzheimers and other forms of dementia are a big problem in an older population like ours, and one of their characteristics is that the person having dementia is belligerent about insisting there is nothing wrong with them. We went through this with my husband's mother when she first got AZD, who drove off the road for a minute, and right through some high bushes without even knowing she'd done it. When confronted, she said: "those bushes needed trimming anyway". Many of these folks have no relatives here to notice these things and stop the person from driving. I know an older woman right now who has totaled 4 cars in the last 3 years. She does not have AZD, but she is just inattentive, ditzy, and slow to react. She is still driving and her (irresponsible,IMO) daughter, who lives in another state, just bought her a new car.

I think that more than one accident in any 3 yr. period should trigger some kind of retesting, no matter what the age of the person, but I do not want to see massive retesting for reasons that many have already mentioned.

klutzo,
who desperately wishes she could move somewhere else
 
Only way to get better drivers is to hit them in the pocket. I speed, and here there are practically no fines. If there were, I wouldn't.

Nice thought about speeding but...once you visit Dallas or Texas, you'll know how faulty that is. The fines for speeding here are outrageous, but speed they do. Especially on weekends.
 
Not in utah. You have to have 6 hours of with instructor driving, 6 months of holding a permit, take a driver's education class and on top of all that the lines at the DMV take 3 hours to get through. if you do not have a birth certificate, 2 pieces of make and 3 other forms of identification including a social security number, the originals, not copies, then they will make you come back. Due to all of this, it took me one year and seven months from the time i got my permit to get the license.

did you take Drivers Ed. in high school?
 
No, I dropped out of Highschool 4 months in, so no.

Well aside from that issue, if you had taken a private class like that or the specific class the process become imensely simpler.

Show up with your identification and document from the class for it's completion and viola, you now have your drivers license. You don't even have to deal with lines, they direct you immediatley to the photo-booth.
 
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Well aside from that issue, if you had taken a private class like that or the specific class the process become imensely simpler.

Show up with your identification and document from the class for it's completion and viola, you now have your drivers license. You don't even have to deal with lines, they direct you immediatley to the photo-booth.

Um, I did take a private class. Driver's education is required for all Utah Drivers and it took me nearly two months to get through it. I had to have 6 hours of driving and had to complete like seven or eight tests on Utah's Drivers License Course; and on top of that, we had to pass each test twice.

Then when I went down to the DMV I had to go back four times. Yes, it took me four times to get my drivers license because you have to have the follow:
Social Security Card (original, not a photocopy)
Birth Certificiate (original, not a copy, and it has to be the certificate not the card that they sometimes give people)
Two pieces of mail with your name and address printed on it that are within 30 days of when they were sent out
Your GED or High School Diploma or something else like that
A Utah Identification card
The Instructor's approval envelope


So once you have all of those, then, if you are a minor, you have to have your biological parent bring you and they have to present three different forms of identification and have to sign in front of the workers.

You then are handed a number and you have to wait for the number to be called, it usually takes up to a half hour minumum and maximum I've heard of was like four hours for them to call you up simply to get the photo ID for your license.

After that you get a new number and have the same wait time and then when you go up they do a vision test, and if you don't pass the vision test you have to come back with doctor's approval and several forms of identification and such to prove that you are capable of driving. If you have a disability or any sort of mental or health disease/disorder you have to bring all sorts of documentation.

When you finally get there you have to pay the fee and they only accept certain kinds of credit cards; if you dont have the right kind, guess what? You have to come back the next day.

After you've filled out the paperwork and signed all of the documents they will give you a perma-license and the real one will come in the mail a month or so after, but it usually takes a lot longer.

In Utah you can't drive with anyone but family in the car for 6 months, if you get pulled over and the person who is in the car with you is either a. family but under the age of 21 or b. not family, you get a fine.

It seemed all pretty complicated to me.

Plus; every five years you have to renew your drivers license. You used to be able to do it by mail but now you have to go to the DMV and they do the vision test and everything all over again. If you miss renewing your license it's revoked and you have to go through the process all over again. You can't even do it online anymore; you have to do it in person every single time.
 
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Um, I did take a private class. Driver's education is required for all Utah Drivers and it took me nearly two months to get through it. I had to have 6 hours of driving and had to complete like seven or eight tests on Utah's Drivers License Course; and on top of that, we had to pass each test twice.

Then when I went down to the DMV I had to go back four times. Yes, it took me four times to get my drivers license because you have to have the follow:
Social Security Card (original, not a photocopy)
Birth Certificiate (original, not a copy, and it has to be the certificate not the card that they sometimes give people)
Two pieces of mail with your name and address printed on it that are within 30 days of when they were sent out
Your GED or High School Diploma or something else like that
A Utah Identification card
The Instructor's approval envelope


So once you have all of those, then, if you are a minor, you have to have your biological parent bring you and they have to present three different forms of identification and have to sign in front of the workers.

You then are handed a number and you have to wait for the number to be called, it usually takes up to a half hour minumum and maximum I've heard of was like four hours for them to call you up simply to get the photo ID for your license.

After that you get a new number and have the same wait time and then when you go up they do a vision test, and if you don't pass the vision test you have to come back with doctor's approval and several forms of identification and such to prove that you are capable of driving. If you have a disability or any sort of mental or health disease/disorder you have to bring all sorts of documentation.

When you finally get there you have to pay the fee and they only accept certain kinds of credit cards; if you dont have the right kind, guess what? You have to come back the next day.

After you've filled out the paperwork and signed all of the documents they will give you a perma-license and the real one will come in the mail a month or so after, but it usually takes a lot longer.

In Utah you can't drive with anyone but family in the car for 6 months, if you get pulled over and the person who is in the car with you is either a. family but under the age of 21 or b. not family, you get a fine.

It seemed all pretty complicated to me.

Oye... All I needed to do was take a written test, have a driving test, and then present some documents that I can find in a heartbeat.

And I never even took a driver's ed course... just waited till I was 18 to get my license.
 
Oye... All I needed to do was take a written test, have a driving test, and then present some documents that I can find in a heartbeat.

And I never even took a driver's ed course... just waited till I was 18 to get my license.

All utah drivers are required to take a driver's education course no matter what their age is before a license will be given.
 
All utah drivers are required to take a driver's education course no matter what their age is before a license will be given.

Well obviously I don't live in Utah :D
 
Well obviously I don't live in Utah :D

So, Barnabas, maybe you just need to move to Utah. I think you'll be pretty happy with our pain in the arse system that we got going on, it might make you feel a lot safer and maybe you wouldn't get your panties in a bunch waiting in three hour lines every five years.
 
So, Barnabas, maybe you just need to move to Utah. I think you'll be pretty happy with our pain in the arse system that we got going on, it might make you feel a lot safer and maybe you wouldn't get your panties in a bunch waiting in three hour lines every five years.

Uhm, I'm not Barnabas.

If it makes you feel better, if I were to get a concealed weapons permit, I'd get it in Utah since a lot of states in this area of the country work well with that specific permit...
 
I know that you aren't barnabas.
 
So, Barnabas, maybe you just need to move to Utah. I think you'll be pretty happy with our pain in the arse system that we got going on, it might make you feel a lot safer and maybe you wouldn't get your panties in a bunch waiting in three hour lines every five years.


Not to sound offensive but, a little bit of for thought can save you a lot of hassle and time.

Go during a time of day when people are at work, early in the morning or right as the DMV closes, bring all the identification you need, know what you need before you go(SS#, mail and your Birth Certificate you should already have, a GED or HD isn't a requirent here in FL so I don't know what to tell you about that), and pay in cash (our fee is $25.25, if your's is more then stop by the bank the day before you go or on your way to the DMV).

As for mental health papers well, they seem important enough to be checked if neccesary and I believe a sight test only takes a few seconds.


Anywho Utah is to cold, move here to Florida. You'll hit or will have been hit by another car within six monts of driving down here.

completley off topic, may I ask why you droped out of school? if it's personal or something simaler then just tell me to shut up and i'll only be mildly offended.
 
Not to sound offensive but, a little bit of for thought can save you a lot of hassle and time.

Go during a time of day when people are at work, early in the morning or right as the DMV closes, bring all the identification you need, know what you need before you go(SS#, mail and your Birth Certificate you should already have, a GED or HD isn't a requirent here in FL so I don't know what to tell you about that), and pay in cash (our fee is $25.25, if your's is more then stop by the bank the day before you go or on your way to the DMV).

As for mental health papers well, they seem important enough to be checked if neccesary and I believe a sight test only takes a few seconds.


Anywho Utah is to cold, move here to Florida. You'll hit or will have been hit by another car within six monts of driving down here.

completley off topic, may I ask why you droped out of school? if it's personal or something simaler then just tell me to shut up and i'll only be mildly offended.

Well I'm actually in college so I didn't drop of school persay, just high school.

I really really hated high school. It was a nightmare. I hated the people, teachers, classes, feeling like I had no control, having to be certain places by law and like, having crappy teachers that talking about the morals of abortion during history....learning nothing...feeling like I already knew the stuff I was being taught.
 
Well I'm actually in college so I didn't drop of school persay, just high school.

I really really hated high school. It was a nightmare. I hated the people, teachers, classes, feeling like I had no control, having to be certain places by law and like, having crappy teachers that talking about the morals of abortion during history....learning nothing...feeling like I already knew the stuff I was being taught.

Interesting, I have both a niece and a nephew whom droped out of highschool, both on there way to sucessful and happy lives. I'm glad to see it's going well for you to.

High School I enjoyed, now Middle School that I wish I could of droped out of or just skipped.
 
Not to sound offensive but, a little bit of for thought can save you a lot of hassle and time.

Go during a time of day when people are at work, early in the morning or right as the DMV closes, bring all the identification you need, know what you need before you go(SS#, mail and your Birth Certificate you should already have, a GED or HD isn't a requirent here in FL so I don't know what to tell you about that), and pay in cash (our fee is $25.25, if your's is more then stop by the bank the day before you go or on your way to the DMV).

As for mental health papers well, they seem important enough to be checked if neccesary and I believe a sight test only takes a few seconds.

Also I realise that I never responded to this. I went to the DMV each time one hour before it opened (so I got there at 6:00am) and there was already a line. When it's ten minutes to open the line extends to the parking lot. And, they have really bad communication down there. When we went in the first time they said we wouldn't need to bring all the identfication documents again because they had it in their system but then when we went without it as well as not filling out another app they said we needed all of it. This continued for the four trips.