The long statewide nightmare is over.
After months of frustrating technical glitches, confusing options and wildly irrelevant test questions, most California drivers age 70 and older applying to renew their driver’s licenses now have to take a knowledge test or online training course. There will be no need to take.
Overall this is good news. But as is often the case with the DMV, Monday’s announcement was a bit of a surprise, coming after months of efforts by the agency to update its website glitches and clarify many of the test-taking options for older drivers. .
I’m one of the thousands of useless people who endured the system, having recently renewed my license. I think we should roll back our $45 renewal fee, and I’m wondering if anyone cares to support this proposal. In fact, I should have gotten $90 refunded because the online e-learning option was so difficult for me to access, I accidentally paid twice.
So why abandon the requirement after so much work refining the process and educating the public?
The answer is not completely satisfactory.
DMV Director Steve Gordon said in a written statement, “If thousands less people need to come to the DMV, or can spend less time in an office, those who need to conduct their business at one of our offices will Need to be taken care of, they can be served better.” ,
Spokeswoman Anita Gore told me the new rule will mean 50,000 fewer people each month will come to DMV offices to take renewal exams. This is expected to free up staff to handle registration, Real ID and other business and reduce wait times for those services.
OK, but did Gordon actually wake up one day and decide it was time to give the older drivers an early Christmas present, or was it about a chronic understaffing amid a state budget shortfall, or a The concession that the DMV couldn’t fix was its amateurish website and useless online testing application?
“The DMV has been on this journey for several years to improve customer service and digitalize services, and this is another step in that process,” Gore said.
She told me she was unaware that Gordon, who was appointed five years ago by Governor Gavin Newsom, had discussed the idea with his boss. But he said he has been in regular contact with the administration about the changes Gordon has made since leaving his career in Silicon Valley to try to modernize and advance the DMV, which has long been the state’s Has been one of the most dangerous public agencies.
DMV spokeswoman Anita Gore says the new rule will mean 50,000 fewer people each month coming to DMV offices to take renewal exams.
Gordon tells me there is no strong correlation between testing and driving ability. That’s one reason he’s pushing for e-learning courses (which you can take online) as an alternative to the traditional knowledge test (which can be taken online or in person at a DMV office).
The e-learning course, which I took when I renewed two months ago, is an animated 45-minute rules-of-the-road program that has the advantage of being fail-proof. A narrator leads you through several sections of instruction, each of which is followed by a quiz. If you get an answer wrong, you can guess again until you get it right.
But I still heard from a lot of readers who, like me, were struggling to figure out how to access the program.
And plenty of readers with decades of clean driving records, who studied hard, crammed in for days, and still failed traditional knowledge tests, thanks to those ridiculous questions that insisted that driving That there was no impact on his ability.
They were not wrong.
One of the most derisive questions was about the fine for leaving an animal on the side of the road, as if this is a common occurrence for anyone, let alone drivers 70 and older.
And then there were these:
“What is another name for the hand-to-hand steering method?”
Who cares?
“What is the minimum term of imprisonment for a person… convicted of murder resulting from evading law enforcement during a pursuit?”
I don’t know, but isn’t it a question of the person asking this question going to jail?
“For how many seconds should you scan the road in front of your vehicle, to identify hazards?”
Are they kidding?
No, they weren’t, but in a sign of progress, a few months ago the DMV actually started dumping some of the goofy questions that readers had complained about.
Even though most drivers age 70 and older are now exempt from tests, they will still need to visit a DMV office for an eye exam and photo.
(Irrfan Khan/Los Angeles Times)
So now that it’s a new day for older drivers in California, what should you do if you’ve already received a license renewal notice in the mail, or if you get one in the coming days and weeks?
You may ignore the instructions for taking the test because you are in trouble. You’ll still have to go to a DMV office for an eye exam and photo, but the DMV is considering the possibility of – someday – getting clearance from an eye doctor and offering a remote option for the photo.
However, the new rules come with some caveats.
If you’re a first-time driver, or have recently moved to California, or have a bad driving record, sorry, but you’ll still have to take a knowledge test or e-learning course, regardless of your age.
One final point about testing:
Since I started writing about the DMV about two years ago, I’ve heard from readers who thought that requiring testing for drivers over 70 is a case of age discrimination. But I never fully agreed.
Of course, bad drivers come at all ages. But for most of us, gradual visual loss is inevitable, reaction times slow down, and driving at night becomes a challenge. As I’ve said before, it’s worth discussing whether there should be an actual driving test after a certain age, which would be much more useful than a knowledge test.
Do you agree? And if yes, what will be that age?
If you want to know, you know where to find me.
steve.lopez@latimes.com
