Canadian driving school discontinuing stick shift instruction

thats how it was here too. if you go on holiday, and all the rental cars are standards, what are you going to do, hire a driver?

 

This is still the case in Australia and Britain.

An Australian or British licence will have an "automatic" restriction on it if you did your test in an auto, and you wouldn't be able to hire a manual car. But an American licence doesn't carry such a restriction, so if you go abroad, you're free to hire a manual car and make an appalling mess of it.

There's a roundabout near Heathrow that is always best avoided when the concentrated bunches of American flights come in. There's always a load of Americans just off the plane who haven't driven on the left before, haven't dealt with a busy roundabout before, and don't know how to drive a manual.

 

Ugh, I admit to embarrassing myself when test driving a Sonic with a manual, but my previous experience was learning on a diesel Rabbit and a U-Haul truck rental, and I wouldn't shy away trying it again. I think I'd pay the extra fees for an automatic in any left driving country, though. Reaching for the shifter with the wrong hand would just be too much in addition to driving on the wrong side.

 

ya, i haven't tried that one yet, and i don't even feel comfortable going around the roundabouts the wrong way in an automatic!

 

Keep in mind that one Canadian Driving School discontinuing their manual stick shift training doesn't necessarily mean the end of the stick shift.
I think there will always be enthusiasts that prefer stick shift to manual.

Plus as far as "learning" goes, I think it's far easier to learn on an automatic, and then add stick shift later. Even though when I was taught to drive all we had were stick shifts and I had to learn stick first. I'm guessing at a driving school a lot of students just want the quickest and easiest path to obtaining their licence. If they don't even own a stick shift, the demand for the class would decline.

No doubt the popularity of stick shifts are declining, with the improvement and proliferation of automatic transmissions, but I personally hope the stick shift remains.

It's been a while for myself, but a stick shift can be a lot of fun to drive. I sometimes miss not having one. I always felt with a stick shift, I could get more "fun" out of a 4 cylinder engine. Not a scientific evaluation, but I enjoy driving a stick shift.

 

We had no problem with that in New Zealand, though being an all-MT household, our situation was different.

The only things that caught us were the frequent single lane bridges. Nearly every time the spouse came off those, she reverted back to the American side of the road.

 

I rented a Citroen Xsara Picasso in the UK 14 years ago (with manual, natch, as well as an HDI diesel).

The only thing I found awkward was that the shift pattern is the same--it would have been easier if it were mirror-imaged.

With all the roundabouts I quickly learned where 2nd gear is but it always felt strange (pushing away and rearward).