Okay, I've decided ignorance is not bliss. I need to know the cold, hard truth... what is the driving school and test experience like in Ireland? I've heard the high failure rates and other such horror stories, but what aspect of the test seems to trip folks up?
I can handle it... no need to sugar coat lol. I'm already accepting that I may be doomed to three years of schlepping my kids to and from school on the Luas if it comes to that lol!
I just read these couple of pages on another board about why people fail. It seems many people fail due to the reversing around a corner part of the test. Why on earth that's part of the test, I don't know! Maybe for when you need to reverse down a country lane to let another vehicle pass?
http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2055297727
I think it's best to tough it out and just do it! Just don't pick up any bad habits in your first 'free' year of driving 🙂 Unless the Luas is super convenient for you, and you don't mind the loss of freedom of a car.
I'm also a little concerned part of the test may involve these non-road roads (let's be real, some are so narrow they're walking paths at best lol!).
I'm going to do a fair amount of Googling to see what I turn up on this subject. Also my husband will be the first guinea pig. Depending on his experience goes, I'll have to decide if it's the Luas for me.
The driving test is done in an urban area, no need to worry about being taken down single lane country roads! If you're driving in Dublin you'll obviously need to watch for the luas as it shares some roads with other vehicles. On some of these roads is can be quite easy to drive into an area meant only for trams and get into trouble so look out for signs saying 'trams only'.
Even if you have experience driving elsewhere, make sure to get driving lessons with an instructor that knows the area you will be doing the test in. Many of the instructors will know what routes are used for the actual test so that should allow you to get practice on those roads. It also allows you to learn where all the gotchas on those routes are. These can include poor road signage, missing stop signs, badly configured traffic lights and one way systems that don't follow any pattern.
Might be a no brainer but be sure to check if the speedometer in the car you're driving is displayed predominantly in miles or kilometres. We only switched to using kilometers for speed limits in 2005, so UK imports and Irish cars from 2004 and older are miles dominant. There's a big difference between 50 km/h and 50 mph!