I don't know, but it seems as though my DH always did the running around in our case. I rarely, if ever, recall the X doing any driving. We were all pretty much in the same town, though she moved around a lot and would technically be considered living in a 'differet' town, it was never more than a 20 min. drive.

On "her" weekends w/ the kids, if there was a sleepover for one of the kids that was more than a minute's drive, we'd get called repeatedly to do the dropping off and picking up. We never really seemed to have a weekend w/o the driving.

On the "up" side of the equation, I did like that we knew where the kids were and who was in the house w/ them, as in a slumber party or something...

Dana

DD's father is specifically ordered to pick up and drop her off at my residence in the CO.

In my DH's initial divorce decree, it was silent on this matter, so my DH did ALL of the picking up and dropping off (her house is 1 hour from ours). When we went back to court, the new order states they are to meet at our church (1/2 way point) for pick up and drop off, but half the time DH still drives for some stupid reason or the other.

We have an interesting situation that is about to transpire. My husbands job is 200 miles away from our family home and his son lives 1/2 mile away from our house. He and his ex share 50/50 custody although she demands more time with the boy. We have decided to sell the house and move to the town where his job is. Here comes the interesting part, his ex has said that there is no way that she will drive the child to the half-way point in between the two towns. To solve this problem we have hired a lawyer and our lawyer has said that a judge will have no problem enforcing the ex to drive the child to the half-way point, and if she doesn't show up on scheduled days then she will be in contempt.

This woman is late for everything, so I will be interested to see if she shows up with the boy.
My step-son has told me and his father that he wants to live with us full-time because he likes having rules and chores and at his mom's he is allowed to stay up all night on school nights playing video games. I set rules for my son and my step-son, on school nights bedtime is 8:30. The boys are 14 and 13.

My DH's decree states that neither party can make the other wait for more than 15 minutes. Since BM is usually late, you might want to put some verbage in about wait time.

Second wife,

I would be careful relying on attorneys. They get paid by hour.

Where I live if one parent moves away, that parent is likely to end up with all the driving. At most they would ask the mom to drive the child the equivalent of where dad used to live. I assume that where you live now is whre parents lived when they were married.

My finace's divorce decree covers transportation. Receiving parent provides transportation. There is a half hour wait window otherwise the other parent forfeits that visitation.

We have never had an issue with transportation. I think it works well for his son - he is not waiting in a car or someplace else if the receiving parent is running late. We live in So Cali, so even though we only live 15 miles from Bio Mom, it can still take an hour to get there with traffic!

Although I don't ever forsee this happening, I am not sure if things would be different if either parent moved a significant distance away.

It makes sense for the one who moves away to do the driving. If one parent moves away, he is likely to lose 50/50 custody.

Is this for real?:
"My step-son has told me and his father that he wants to live with us full-time because he likes having rules and chores and at his mom's he is allowed to stay up all night on school nights playing video games."

I suspect this poster is trying to yank our collective chains.

I am not trying to pull anyone's chain. My husband and his ex go to court tomorrow and we will see who has to drive and how far they have to drive. We are in California and there are other people we know who drive to the half-way point for visitation. As far as the 50/50 custody I should have been more clear, they have joint physical, joint legal custody of the boy. There was a time where he was with us for a year full time for CPS issues with his mom. This is an on-going problem with her issues.

I agree, this sounds strange.

California courts have consistently held - you move at your own risk. If you game plan is to get 50/50 on driving and then move, I think you are sadly mistaken.

IMO, a good decree stipulates who does the driving, and also what will happen if either parent moves away. In my decree, my Ex had to do all the driving (15 minutes each way) and I got to determine place of residence with no restrictions. (The dope was too cheap to hire his own lawyer.) I was very reasonable on the financial stuff, though, wich was what he really cared about.

After I moved to another city 250 miles away, I voluntarily agreed to do half the transportation because it seemed fair.

My agreement just says no one can move out of the county. I have no intention of moving and making DD change schools. He sees DD so seldom it doesnt matter.

My husband just got back from court, here is the verdict: The custody has changed as well as visitation . He no longer has 50/50 custody (we knew this was going to happen)Now changed to joint physical, joint legal. Visitation is as follows, every other weekend, 1/2 of the summer and every other holiday. As far as transportation for visitation goes, the judge ordered that the Bio-mom can either drive, place child on a bus or a train, but has to meet us at the half-way point and cannot be more than 30 minutes late.

How old is this child who is going to be put on train or bus?

He is now 13

I would never put a child that age on a train or bus alone. I have put my daughter that age on plane alone, but paid the fee for unaccompanied minor. It sounds to me that your dislike of X is being taken out on this poor child. This sounds unworkable.

I assume noncustodial parent would drive back and forth because he/she is the one who has visitations. It would just make sense that he/she picks the kid up at a custodial parent's house. That how it was with my ex when our daughter was young.

I do not dislike the Ex at all, in fact she and I are on friendly terms. The judge is the one that put the bus and the train into the equation, not my husband or his ex. The ex is willing to make the drive to the half-way point but they went to court to make it official. Her live-in boyfriend was trying to be controlling and telling her to not make the drive, she is the one who petitioned the court on this matter to have it on paper that she is to make the drive so that the b/f can't try to influence her not to.

I have read, in general, that NCP should pick up for visit, and then CP should pick up at end of visit, so child never feels he is being pushed off on another parent and that someone is trying to get rid of him.

This situaton though, with parent moving 200 miles is vastly different. I think whoever moves should bear burden.

I see your point of view, but it is not for me to decide what my husband and his ex do concerning the visitation or the driving.My input was never asked for in this matter. I will just have to go with the final decision, and they made that decision today in court.

Well BM picks thems up (late) and drops them off(early). Supposed to pick them up at 5pm shows up at 6 pm. Supposed to keep them until the end of the school day drops off at 8 am. Thursdays she does pick them up at 3pm and keeps them till 11am on friday.

But most fridays I pick them up after they are at mom's I usually have stuff to do ... And I can take them with me.

My husband's ex moved 2 hours away and her son stayed with us. She violated the custody agreement by taking his 17 y/o daughter with her, so my husband insisted that it be in writing that since SHE decided to move away, the burden of the drive remains on her. That was over 2 years ago and we have never done the drive. After years of her acting irresponsibly, my husband decided that he was no longer going to "enable" her . . . she made the decision, she needs to live the consequences. It was also part of teaching the children that they are not responsible for cleaning up Mom's messes, and that you need to think things through before you make decisions that effect other people......

As for the son wanting to live with Dad and SM because of the structure -- EXACTLY our situation! My SS prefers to be in a home where he knows there are rules, but he also knows that we will take care of him and his basic needs. He gets to be a child....and doesn't have to take care of us (as his sister does with their mom).

In our case, my husband's ex moved one state away with the kids. They agreed to meet halfway ( about 3 1/2 hours drive for each of them), at mutally agreeable times for visitation. That was a huge mistake, since every time H called to arrange it, the ex would claim she couldnt possibly meet him, and he would have to drive 7 hours each way by himself to see the kids.

Now we have also moved out of the original state, and the kids must fly to visit us. We pick up the cost of the flights , totally, about ten thousand a year, on top of the 22 thousand we pay her for child support. His ex refuses to allow the kids to fly unaccompanied, even with the airline service for unaccompanied minors, so H has to fly all the way to pick them up, stay in a hotel overnight, fly back with them, and then do the same on the return. We are currently considering petitioning the court to either force the ex to allow the kids to fly unaccompanied , with the extra airline service, or to reduce our child support, to help cover some of the extra cost that we incurr by having to have H pick them up. Its a shame really. I would much rather give the money to his ex for extra child support than give it to the airline for the extra ticket.

Yes, I know we moved, but she ( the ex) moved out of state first, and then refused to abide by the agreed visit plan. I am sure she would be happiest of all if we never saw the kids, but that isnt going to happen. Despite all of her attempts to drive a wedge between my husband and his kids, their bond is still as strong as ever, and the visits are much looked forward to on both sides.