Rumplestiltskin

Same here except I didn't have to turn left, just three rights. Also had to start with a parallel park which was about 4-6 inches off the kerb... Being from London (where that's the only type of parking) I wanted to do it again but they said it was fine.

Likewise. When I pulled over to be told I'd passed I was expecting 3-point-turns and emergency stops to follow.

TimberHut

Sounds like it is a bit harder here (Indiana).

I had to drive for around 10/15 mins.

It included parallel parking & (hardest of all) doing 20 in a school zone even though the lights weren't actually flashing. If you do 30 on this road you soon pick up a long tail - let alone 20 (when you don't actually have to). Not hard to do but it felt awful!

I touched the kerb whilst parking (only lightly but all the same - grrrrhhhh!!!). I cringed under my breath at the thought of having to take the test again. Didn't have to though - passed 1st time.

The USA test is definitely less strict than the UK one. Even to the point where you can take the test in an automatic - pass it - and then be legal to drive a stick-shift.

Good luck to anyone due to take it. You'll be fine.

EricK

Did I do anything in the UK before leaving with regards to the US driving test? No. I took an International driving license with me - get it from the Post Office.

I arranged a rental for a month before arriving. You can't register a car here in CT without a drivers license, so you can't buy anthing until you pass. You have to sit for 8 hours in a drivers education class (watch videos telling you how bad drink / drug driving is). You can't apply for your license without a certificate from the course.

Here are some helpful links:
http://www.ct.gov/dmv/taxonomy/taxon...dmvNav=|41638|

See point 3 here regards the CS1 cert you need:
http://www.ct.gov/dmv/cwp/view.asp?a...=|28069|#28074

Other than that just drive around for a couple of weeks to get used to the roads, take the 8 hour class and go to the DMV to apply for your license.

Meryl

I finally got around to doing my Texas drivers test last month (would have done it alot sooner except an idiot in an suv drove right into me and trashed the first car I bought.....so I'm on my second car in 4 months now lol)

It was so easy- they made me reverse park into a space between 2 cones (you could have parked a double decker bus in it, it was that big!), then I drove around the block and that was that!

In general I find the drivers here to be terrible, not to mention rude!

The Horticulturalist

You really won't need that to take the test, it's not required, your UK licence will be fine - don't let them keep it though.

Once you become resident in whatever state then the DMV dictates how long you can drive on your foreign licence before you need to take the test. For some states it's as little as a week, I think we had to do it within a month.

HumphreyC

My wife is from a village (or town as they insist on calling it) in Massachusetts called Ashburnham; she took her test in the nearby city of Fitchburg around about Christmas Eve when she was 17. They don't have professional examiners in the U.S, instead she got into the car with a local cop who made her pull out of the plaza they were in an drive across to the adjacent parking lot. There he leapt out and went into the store because he had to take a piss.

When he came back he made her park up where she had started and she did it completely crookedly, leaving the car sped-eagled across several spaces. The cop then said 'Don't worry, i'm sure you'll learn how do do that properly when you go shopping with your girlfriends' and then passed her saying 'I couldn't fail you anyway, it's Christmas!'.

Scary.

TimberHut

Scary yes - but also quite funny!

Foreign Redneck

I agree, the driving test is so easy here, i hold regular driving licences for South Carolina and Virginia as well as CDL for both states.

I only had to sit one test for regular licence and one for CDL, to get licences changed to different States cost $15 for each.

SultanOfSwing

I did my test at the Libertyville, IL DMV in 2006. I got there in the afternoon, and must have been a late addition to my examiner's list because she seemed a bit browned off when she got in the car to start. This was after the piss easy theory test on the computers.

Anyway, we drove out of the car park and onto the main road before she had me turn down a side street into a residential area, whereupon we drove around for a few minutes before she had me reverse round a corner and set off again. May have done a 3 point turn as well, I'm not too clear, but we got back to the DMV she said that's it and buggered off leaving me to get the photo and that was that.

A far cry from my driving test done in Belfast, at 2:30 on a Friday in the University/Lisburn Road area just when everyone seemed to be leaving work early for a laugh. When my examiner turned to me and opened with the line 'well, there were a few magic moments there' I thought I'd failed but I passed, albeit with a grilling from my instructor on how crap I was!

Plus the prices as well - compare the $10.00 I spent on my license here to the UK one - $13.00 for theory test, $30 odd for the practical and $40 odd for the use of the instructor's car 'cause me ma wouldn't let me do it in hers! Plus I probably got well over $150.00 in lessons as well, and now I come to think of it, didn't I also then have to pay for the license itself??

sir_eccles

I recently took my test here in Phoenix AZ.

First was the sweaty palm touch screen theory test. The lady had told me how many I was allowed to get wrong. I had barely glanced at the DOT manual online. It keeps a tally of your score and I got down to the last two questions with only one wrong answer to spare. My heart was pounding.

Then for the actual driving test. Almost regretted borrowing my wife's Lincoln Towncar. It isn't the most practical car for performing a three point turn within some cones with the examiner's warning ringing in my ears that touching a cone was an instant fail. More sweaty palms and a half inch to spare.

We chatted about the Arsenal football shirt he was wearing as we drove round the block and we were done. Big sigh of relief.

Meryl

lol, it took me 8 attempts to pass my test in the UK, and 10 mins to pass it in the USA.......I rest my case

Rumplestiltskin

Drivers in Dallas beware

Norri

You almost managed to make it sound difficult.

sir_eccles

Well, when you've been driving for 20 some odd years and suddenly you have to take the test again to prove you can drive, it's a little nerve racking. I think my nerves made me inflate it into something more difficult than it really was.

Kar98

I don't think you're supposed to. I'm pretty sure you're only supposed to have a drivers' license from one state, and if you have a CDL, you're not supposed to have a regular license either.