Comment by guerrilla
19 days ago
> Politically very difficult to take people's licences away though, especially when it's permanent, not their fault and it makes their life a lot worse.
It shouldn't be permanent. If they can improve, then why not? Maybe illness causes their poor driving and they find a treatment for that illness.
> If they can improve, then why not?
I'm talking about removing licences due to cognitive decline. It's not a temporary condition
Theoretically it can be, though usually not, so the question is what should be the law to cover the general case. It wouldn’t be such a problem if it were easy for them to get around without driving. Either self driving cars, subsidized Ubers, public transit, walkable cities, home delivery, etc.
My opinion is that in the general case people over 70 shouldn’t be driving and I say this as someone who has 4 spritly grandparents in their 90s. I really don’t like how dangerous roads are, a fact that we accept because we did not really have good alternatives, now that we do we should implement them.
Paul Newman won his last race at Lime Rock in Sept. 2007 driving a 900-horsepower Corvette when he was 82.
5 replies →
> It's not a temporary condition
You have no way of knowing that. There's no reason it should be written into law. If they can pass the test, then they can drive. Testing already takes care of what you want. If it truly isn't a temporary condition, then you have nothing to worry about.
It can be for "3 months" (with a low expectation that after 3 months they improve enough to get the licence again).
It's a vague definition though.
All cognitive decline is not equal.
If they're able to drive they should be allowed to