Keeping Our Eyes on the Road: How an Aging Population Will Get from Here to There

Source: AARP Press Center | August 24, 2005

Dr. Byron Thames
Member, AARP Board of Director
The Florida Council on Aging Mobility Challenges Panel in Orlando, FL

August 24, 2005

Good morning. I am Byron Thames, a member of the Board of Directors of AARP. I am a physician and a long-time resident of Orlando. I am also a driver who's young enough to remember the thrill of how it felt to get behind the wheel of a car for the first time. And I'm old enough to notice how much things have changed since then. I'd like to talk about some of those changes.

But first, I want to thank the Florida Council on Aging for inviting me to be part of this panel. I believe the conversation we will have today is vitally important to our car-loving country. And particularly important to all of us here in Florida.

I hope this conference will shed light on those issues that are too often overlooked - safety, mobility, and transportation for Florida's rapidly growing senior population. And I hope that it will serve as a catalyst for positive changes.

Nationally, we're just a few years away from a dramatic demographic shift. The baby boom generation is getting older. The latest predictions say that by the year 2030, one in five Americans will be 65 or older. And at least three-fourths of all members of that group will be licensed drivers.

As bad as traffic is today, it isn't likely to get any better as our population ages. Older people prefer using private vehicles more than any other mode of transportation. They make nearly 90 percent of their trips in a private vehicle, either as a passenger or driver. And they do this even when public transit is affordable and available.

In Florida, the number of drivers over the age of 65 is expected to increase even faster than the age 65 plus population itself. Here in Orlando, with its constant influx of retirees, we can already see a sharp increase in older drivers on our roads. We're becoming more aware that these older drivers must deal with gradual changes in functioning, changes in their reflexes, their ability to make quick decisions, their vision at night. Changes that can have a definite impact on driving.

Because of these changes, many older drivers begin to monitor themselves. Some stop driving at night. Others choose to use only familiar roads during off-peak hours. And, for the most part, older individuals are safe drivers. As a group, they have lower rates of crashes than younger drivers; they have the lowest percentage of crashes involving alcohol and the highest rate of seatbelt use of any age group.

But, even so, Florida, which leads the country in the number of older residents and older drivers, also leads the country in the number of fatal automobile accidents involving drivers over the age of 75.

This increased incidence of fatal crashes can be attributed mostly to increased fragility, which makes people 75 and older more likely to be killed or injured in a crash. But it can also be attributed, in part, to the driving environment - complicated intersections, hard to read signs, badly timed traffic lights.

Along with our causes for concern about the gradual changes in elderly drivers, we also need to pay attention to the gradual changes in those people over 65, 75, and 85 who have given up driving. Because driving cessation may result in losing community mobility.

As a family doctor, I can tell you first hand what happens when seniors lose their independence and are stranded without adequate transportation options. It's not just a matter of a little inconvenience. They become sedentary and isolated, and it sucks the life right out of them - literally and figuratively.

It cuts them off from family, social opportunities and civic activities. It makes it harder to go to the doctor or the pharmacy. It too often leads to depression, obesity, even alcoholism, and declining health in general.

I've seen it in my practice, but I'm sure many of you in this room also know a relative, friend or neighbor who's gone from vibrant and vigorous to sad and lethargic, simply because they have no easy way to get around.

One of AARP's most recent studies found that non-drivers over the age of 75 say they face severe restrictions on their daily activities. In fact, they were six times as likely as drivers to miss doing something they would have liked to do because they did not have the transportation.

The mobility challenge will be that much greater when it comes to this current wave of aging Americans. Not just because of their large numbers and their long life expectancy…but because the baby boomers are the most mobile generation in the history of civilization.

They've lived their entire adult lives in a society where driving and living are practically one and the same. Think about it. If you're turning 60 this year, it means you grew up steeped in the car-crazed consumerism of post-war America. It means you were getting your license when the interstate highway system was being built. It means your attitudes and values were being shaped at just the moment that the car was becoming a powerful cultural icon denoting status and independence.

These folks are attached to their cars. They want to extend their driving lives as long as they possibly can. And we should do everything we can to help them.

AARP is one of several organizations that offer Driver Safety Programs. 700,000 people a year complete the AARP course, where they learn to adjust their driving behavior to stay safe and confident as they experience the vision changes and slower reaction times that are a normal part of aging.

But for many elderly people—and it will probably happen to many more in the coming decades-there comes that day when they have to hand over the keys.

Then what?

As a society and as individual communities, we have to be ready.

But as a nation, we don't yet have a truly multimodal transportation vision. Other nations, like Sweden for example, begin their planning with the assumption that one form of transportation can't possibly serve the entire community.

But here in the U.S., 60 years of federal transportation policy has focused almost exclusively on the construction and maintenance of roads to accommodate the automobile. That mindset has to change.

We need more pedestrian-safe communities. Remember sidewalks? Sometimes it seems like they've gone the way of the Studebaker. So many neighborhoods are designed to make walking as unpleasant and dangerous as possible, especially if you're older and you don't move so quickly.

We need aggressive investment in our mass transit systems. In a recent survey we conducted at AARP, 60 percent of seniors said that there was no public transportation within 10-minute walking distance of their homes. The suburbs and rural areas are badly underserved in this area. And even many urban public transportation systems are geared toward commuters, offering infrequent service during off-peak hours or to areas where there aren't many offices and workplaces. We need greater innovation—more feeder routes, more dial-a-ride options, and more hybrid services.

And by the way, public transportation shouldn't just be seen as a last resort when driving is no longer an option. It should be prevalent enough in our communities that people are accustomed to using it regularly throughout their lives.

We also need to do more to encourage specialized transportation operated by human service agencies and non-profits. That includes clearing barriers that keep these agencies from obtaining insurance to cover volunteer drivers.

It's going to take more public dollars. It's going to take grass roots activism from the citizens who live with the consequences of these decisions every day. And it's going to take an increased commitment from our policymakers.

At AARP, our vision is to help Americans 50 and over age with dignity and purpose. But there can be no dignity or purpose without the ability to get from here to there. Increasing the options for mobility and transportation is at the heart of AARP's 10-year social impact agenda. Meeting the needs of an aging population, keeping them safe as drivers and then mobile and independent when they stop driving—these are all part of our program.

The challenge is an awesome one, but we have no choice. We have to do it if we want to stay true to universal American values like freedom, dignity and choice.