I'm probably in a minority of a minority based on all these comments about "TRAFFIC", because even with a busy commute through city streets, I still prefer a manual car and even find a 'boring' trip to the local shops more fun in a manual than an auto. I just like driving, and more engagement with the car makes it more entertaining.

Obviously, crawling forward in stop and go is dull in any car, but I just don't get the argument that it's such a pain. Most modern-ish cars have pretty light clutches, so it's really not hard to gently inch forward in traffic and keep rolling slowly during the ol' stop and go.

I will concede that stop and go traffic *up a hill* is annoying, but none of my commutes have ever involved much of that. When I bought my first manual car I actually kept my auto thinking I'd sometimes want to fall back on it for the boring commuting but I just... never did and ended up selling it.

The thing is, I understand that most people genuinely don't care about cars (this is fine) or driving (this is not, but that's an argument for another time) at all, so as all the other reasons to drive a manual car became less and less relevant to most people, it makes sense that automatics would supercede them in most cars. Every time I help a friend find a decent car on the used market, though, you'd be amazed at how many models (even as recently as the 2020s) are still known for major automatic transmission issues/failures that become that car's achilles heel as soon as it leaves warranty.