On a recent warm June evening, the cars were backed up in Duncan Plaza's parking lot in McCandless, their teen drivers eagerly waiting to take a whack at the parallel parking practice spot set up by the state Bureau of Motor Vehicles.

Alyssa Cwanger, Post-Gazette Leslie Molyneaux, left, of Richland guides her daughter Amy, 16, in parallel parking at Duncan Plaza in McCandless. Click photo for larger image. Listen in Leslie Molyneaux provides the mother's perspective on teaching her teenage daughter how to drive Her daughter, Amy Molyneaux, talks about the obstacles she's trying to overcome in learning enough to earn her license Related article Drivers education costs

There was Kathleen Nicholas, 16, of O'Hara, and her mom, Sandy. There was Laura Veverka, of the North Hills, a late-bloomer at 18, with her dad, Ken.

Then there was Frank Spinarelli, of Shaler, age 91 -- OK, so he's not a teenager. "I had one crazy accident," he muttered unhappily, after expertly maneuvering his Ford subcompact into the spot. "I've been driving for 75 years, and they want me to take another test."

With summer here, so, too, is a new wave of driving-wannabes. According to PennDOT, the number of learners permits issued and driver's tests administered increases by 30 percent to 35 percent during the summer months. Most of them, with the exception of Mr. Spinarelli and his ilk, are teenagers hoping or needing to drive themselves to summer jobs, parties and, of course, Sandcastle.

You'll see them out in force in the evenings, practicing their driving skills in empty office parking lots and cul-de-sacs, with mom or dad in the passenger's seat. And that muffled sound you hear is the parent yelling, "brake ... BRAKE!" ... or worse.

And while mastering parallel parking is still the biggest obstacle to that new license -- particularly among suburban teens who encounter little curb time -- modern living brings a whole host of new issues to the driving range. Should they answer that cell phone while behind the wheel? Is it kosher to listen to their iPod and drive, too? And why can't they fly down the highway like they've done for years with their video game joystick?

That's not all that has changed.

It's downright harder for a 16-year-old to get a license these days than it was a few decades ago.

Now Pennsylvania, along with 44 other states, has a graduated license law aimed at the state's estimated 116,000 16- and 17-year-old drivers.

	Teen accidents Accidents in Pennsylvania involving 16-year-old drivers have declined since a 1999 graduated license law went into effect. Crashes involving 16-year-old drivers 1999: 6,203 2005: 3,219 Crashes involving 17-year-old drivers 1999: 8,977 2005: 7,400 Fatalities involving 16-year-old drivers: 1999: 60 2005: 27 Fatalities involving 17-year-old drivers: 1999: 63 2005: 62

There's a good reason for this: Statistics show that even two years of maturity can make a difference in driving safety. Sixteen-year-olds have three times as many accidents as 17-year-olds, and five times as many as 18-year-olds, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.

Pennsylvania's version requires newly hatched 16-year-olds to first get a learner's permit by taking a written and vision test. Then they wait at least six months -- during which they must spend 50 hours of practice driving with an adult -- before taking a driver's license test. Then, if they pass that road test, they will get a "junior" license -- or what driving instructors commonly refer to as the "Cinderella" license, which prohibits any driving between 11 p.m. and 5 a.m.

After one year, the driver is eligible for a regular license after passing a state-approved driver's training course, or will automatically receive a driver's license after turning 18.

To teenagers eager to drive, these may be annoying roadblocks, but they've produced dramatic improvements in safety: Since being enacted in 1999, Pennsylvania's graduated license law has reduced fatalities involving 16-year-old drivers by 55 percent. Some legislators want to reduce those numbers even further. A House bill would prohibit more than one passenger under age 18 in a car driven by a driver with a junior license -- although there would be exceptions for siblings and farm workers, said PennDOT spokeswoman Claudine Battisti.

Reluctant teens

While there are plenty of eager teenagers itching to get their hands on the wheel on their 16th birthday, experts are seeing a trend in the other direction, too.

Spooked by stories of teen car crashes as well as new research into brain development, which has found that delayed neural development in teens undermines their judgment, some parents are forcing their children to wait until they're 17 or 18, says Jonathan Adkins, a spokesman for the Governor's Highway Safety Association in Washington, D.C.

	Alyssa Cwanger, Post-Gazette Leslie Molyneaux teaches her daughter, Amy, how to drive at Duncan Plaza in McCandless. Click photo for larger image.

That trend hasn't surfaced to any great degree in Western Pennsylvania, however, and Mr. Adkins, who grew up in nearby Morgantown, W.Va., says he thinks he understands why.

"A lot is based on geography, and in an area like yours, with a lot of economic development pressures as well as farming communities, young people need to get to jobs, so their parents aren't holding them back from getting that license."

Chelsea Walter of Robinson, who turned 16 in late April, is one of them.

"Chelsea wants to practice driving every chance she gets," said her mother, Lora Walter, with a sigh.

"It's scary," Mrs. Walter said. "I'd like to delay it more, but she does work at the mall and needs to get there. Still, we're not going to let her get her license until we feel she's earned it."

For some parents, it is just too nerve-wracking to teach their children how to drive, so they opt for one of the myriad drivers ed schools in the area instead -- if they can afford it. In the past, many school districts offered drivers education, but after liability insurance costs started to soar in the mid-1980s, many districts discontinued their own programs, offering $35 to defray the cost of private drivers education instead.

That's hardly a drop in the bucket for poorer families, given that the price can range from $250 to $400 for a package that includes 30 hours of classroom study and six hours of road instruction.

Two legislators have proposed a bill that would enable schools to offer $350 toward drivers ed, but because it's funded by raising the fee for a learner's permit from $5 to $50, the outcome is uncertain.

Naturally, Jerry Mancini, owner of the Kennedy Driving School in Coraopolis, thinks the bill is a good idea.

"Insurance companies will give a pretty nice discount on premiums for teens who take drivers education," he says. "After all, statistics show that someone who takes the course is a 70 percent safer driver."

Nerves of steel

Being a driving instructor can require the sang-froid of a jet fighter pilot, however, especially when venturing out onto McKnight Road or Liberty Avenue with a teenager on his first or second try.

		Helpful Web sites for teen drivers and their parents Easy-to-navigate page started by a Maryland high schooler: Teendriving.com Pennsylvania Department of Motor Vehicles: www.dmv.state.pa.us/ young_drivers/index.shtml Sponsored by Governor's Highway Safety Association and Ford Motor Co.: www.drivingskillsforlife.com Good site for parents of teen drivers: www.drivehomesafe.com

Nonetheless, Frank Deutsch, the clean-cut, good-natured owner of Buckle-Up Driving School in Robinson, seems to have the right stuff: patience, a sense of humor and nerves of steel. Since starting his company a few years ago, he's taught more than 100 teenagers how to drive, with few mishaps -- the worst being the time a student backed out of his own driveway too quickly and crashed into a fire hydrant.

On a recent sunny afternoon, his student -- the eager Chelsea Walter, mentioned above -- steered Mr. Deutsch's Chevy Cobalt through Schenley Park with the confidence of a 45-year-old. Once she entered Squirrel Hill's side streets, though, the years fell away as she suddenly gunned the engine and sped up to the car in front of her while this reporter cowered in the back seat.

"You're going too quick behind that car," Mr. Deutsch said gently, with only a trace of urgency in his voice. "You need a good space cushion between your vehicles. And check your mirrors."

"As long as I don't say, 'Oh, my God,' grab the wheel or hit the brakes during our session, then the kid is doing OK," he added, with a laugh.

Not every child is so anxious to get behind the wheel. One woman, also from Robinson, who asked not to be named for fear of embarrassing her daughter, said the teen, a studious, quiet type, only took her permit test when she was threatened with confiscation of her laptop.

"She passed, but she hasn't driven since," said the mother, who added that her daughter's friends are the same way.

"I tell them, 'You people don't get it. You've got to learn to drive, if for nothing else, the identification. It's a necessary part of life, like learning to swim. You might not swim every day, but in an emergency you would at least know how.' "

Parents as teachers

It took only one trip to the parking lot with her son to practice driving to make Frances Wentz-Unites of Banksville realize that she wasn't cut out to be a teacher.

"My son thought because he drove a lot of cars while playing video games he'd be able to drive a car in real life without any problem," Mrs. Wentz-Unites wrote in an e-mail. But once in the parking lot, "he was just like Mario Andretti. I was holding onto a handle on the inside of the passenger side of the car, holding on for dear life, and that is when I decided that he needed drivers education."

Some parents find that overseeing this particular transition toward independence and adulthood doesn't always bring out their best qualities. Erm Buccina of Green Tree says one close call in the Strip District opened his eyes to his own faults.

"We were trying to maneuver down Penn Avenue, and I was preaching about the idiots who double park and pull out on everyone, but before I could finish, this white blur of a vehicle tried to cut across us," Mr. Buccina recalls. "We ended up inches from T-boning this wild man."

His daughter's first question was: "Was that my fault?" followed by a second, more definitive statement: "It wasn't my fault!"

Mr. Buccina responded by lecturing her on the importance of driving defensively, but "thank God it took 20 seconds for my fear to turn to anger, which was just enough time for the white car to get away and for me not to set a bad example as I choked the driver."

On the other hand, Marilyn Lobert of Richland found she was able to efficiently teach her five children how to drive without any problems. Even when confronted with the dreaded parallel-parking obstacles, she would simply head to the nearest empty lot with a stack of cheap laundry baskets.

"I'd stack them bottom to bottom and top to top to simulate other parked cars and block off the amount of space they would have for the car," Ms. Lobert recalled. "When we would return home after a lesson, the siblings would ask the trainee, 'How many baskets did you run over today?' "

Very often, teens seem to listen to their peers rather than their parents, says Leslie Molyneaux, also of Richland, even if that particular friend isn't exactly knowledgeable.

"Amy has insisted on taking along one friend who took and failed her driver's test,' said Mrs. Molyneaux. "She told Amy how to judge where the car is on the road, and Amy seemed to listen to her more than me, which was ironic, since I have 30 years of driving experience."

On a recent night out in North Park, Mrs. Molyneaux and her daughter were practicing in the parking lot by the pool, before heading out onto the park's winding roads.

There were some tense moments.

"Watch the curb here," Mrs. Molyneaux said, through gritted teeth. "Mommy has hit this curb before."

"Oh gee," breathed Amy, as a couple of joggers appeared up ahead on the right side of the road. But she got past them without incident, and her mother patted her comfortingly on the shoulder.

It's been nearly a month since Amy started practicing with her mother in the evenings. She'd still like to talk on the cell phone or listen to the radio while driving, but that's a no-no, "although I don't know why. All my friends listen to the radio," she complained.

Still, Amy has improved considerably, her mother says, despite initial skepticism on the part of 13-year-old sister Colleen, "who was saying she should wear a helmet when Amy is driving," she added with a laugh.

"Nice turn, Amy," she added, as her daughter smartly turned the black Ford Escape up a hill.

"Oh, look," Mrs. Molyneaux added, gazing out the window as the car passed a playground, a wistful sound in her voice. "Remember when I used to take you and Colleen to play there when you were little?"

There was no response from Amy, who had her eyes only on the road ahead.