00489611

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Transportation services and facilities are part of a package that allows the elderly to perform important functions, including moving about at will, engaging in social and recreational activities when desired, and reaching business and social services when needed. However, major deficiencies in assistance to the elderly--from dysfunctional land use patterns to inappropriately targeted human services--exist and are obscured by myths and misconceptions that persist about the transportation patterns and problems of the elderly and how their mobility needs can be met. In addition, the persistence of historical views of the elderly--either no longer valid or totally false--interferes with society's ability to increase access for the elderly to community activities. The data and analysis presented in this paper effectively challenge many myths about the elderly. They suggest that the mobility problems of the elderly require both short term and long term responses in three areas: transportation, land use planning, and human service delivery models. The paper has seven major sections. The first indicates data sources and report organization. The next section focuses on demographic trends in society, especially the suburbanization of the elderly, and the transportation implications of those trends. The following three sections examine how the elderly provide their own transportation--in private vehicles, walking and cycling, in taxis and on transit--outlining current use patterns and barriers facing the elderly in each mode. The use of what has been called "socially provided" transportation--specialized transportation systems, human service agency programs, and volunteer networks--is examined in the next section. Although often advanced as the ultimate solution for the transport problems of the elderly, specialized transportation services face serious problems. In the last section, the data and analyses presented here are summarized and a simplified model is described that predicts both the number who will lose their driving skill and the number of trips that will be lost.

This paper appears in Transportation Research Board Special Report No. 218, Transportation in an Aging Society: Improving Mobility and Safety for Older Persons, Volume 2 - Technical Papers.

pp 21-71

1988

Transportation Research Board Special Report

0-309-04664-5

Print

Figures (5) ; References (51) ; Tables (13)

Aged; Aged drivers; Cyclists; Demographics; Land use planning; Mobility; Needs assessment; Public transit; Service agencies; Social service; Taxicabs; Time duration; Transportation; Trend (Statistics); Walking

Long term; Short term

Planning and Forecasting; Safety and Human Factors; Society; Transportation (General); I72: Traffic and Transport Planning

TRIS, TRB, ATRI

Nov 30 1989 12:00AM

• CRASH PROTECTION FOR OLDER PERSONS
• DRIVER AND PEDESTRIAN TRAINING
• HEADLAMP PERFORMANCE FACTORS AFFECTING THE VISIBILITY OF OLDER DRIVERS IN NIGHT DRIVING
• IMPROVING SAFETY FOR OLDER MOTORISTS BY MEANS OF INFORMATION AND MARKET FORCES
• POTENTIAL IMPROVEMENTS IN ROADWAY DELINEATION FOR OLDER DRIVERS
• RENEWAL LICENSING OF OLDER DRIVERS
• SIGN LEGIBILITY AND CONSPICUITY
• SIGNIFICANCE OF MOBILITY FOR THE WELL-BEING OF THE ELDERLY
• THE SAFETY OF OLDER PERSONS AT INTERSECTIONS
• VISION ASSESSMENT TECHNOLOGY AND SCREENING OLDER DRIVERS: PAST PRACTICES AND EMERGING TECHNIQUES
• VISION SCREENING FOR DRIVER LICENSURE