My father, 72 years, just bought a new car; we visited together some dealers, and his request was "manual gearbox!!!" I've tried to suggest an automatic transmission, cvt, electric or epiciclic I don't care, but I couldn't move him from 3, the number of pedals. So I understand some posts...
I agree with colin, I also think that manual gearbox will slowly disappear; this is not a problem form me, it's not so important for me to have 3 pedals, the two on the right are the most important.. Simply, automatic transmissions are easier to use, are more confortable, are faster in common usage, mileage and reliability are no more a problem; so I understand why customers in europe are moving to manual gearbox to automatic units...
Just a mechanic tip: people use to call CVT some automatic transmission with a belt and one or two variable pulleys. To be precise, a belt and a pulley is only one of the way to obtain a Continuosly Variable Transmission, so we have to call CVT also hydraulic transmissions (tractors, scrapers, the Honda DN01 ...) and electric trasmissions (locomotives, buses and hybrid cars as Toyotas and the I-MMD). So the i-MMD is a CVT, without belts and pulleys but still capable of continuosly changing the transmission ratio between the petrol engine and wheels. And, as we know, also capable to mechanically join petrol engine and wheels at cruising speed, using a clutch to bypass the electric system.