Accessibility plays a fundamental role in the day-to-day lives of individuals. However, the COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the gross inequality in older people’s accessibility to health care and essential services. Months of staying inside, with limited social interactions, reduced opportunities for physical activity, and limited access to health and social care has accelerated the aging process for large numbers of older people and taken a huge toll on their physical and mental health. Furthermore, older people have unique mobility challenges as they typically experience loss of mobility, for example, when they restrict their walking or driving due to physical or cognitive decline associated with aging. Older adults who do not drive or live in places with limited public transportation services are isolated and disadvantaged. Although older people’s accessibility may be substantially different from the general population, common practices in transportation planning use a relatively simple measure of accessibility centered around healthy, able-bodied individuals, lacking consideration of older people’s unique vulnerabilities.
When developing a city’s infrastructure, considering the needs of every demographic is vital for the health and success of the community. One vulnerable group is older adults (defined in this project as people aged fifty or older). The purpose of the project, called "Understanding Travel Behavior and Accessibility for Older Adults: A Comprehensive Framework," was to learn about the transportation habits of older adults and develop a way to mathematically measure accessibility (the ability to access transportation) of older adults. Researchers from the University of Utah used those findings to understand the challenges older adults faced. They hope that their findings will be used to improve older adults’ lives and, in turn, the lives of those around them.
To examine the travel behavior of older adults, the researchers employed two strategies: they distributed a survey and conducted a focus group. They reached 724 older adults with the survey, which was distributed across the state of Utah in paper and online formats. In the survey, participants were asked to rank their four most preferred activities and answer questions regarding transportation to and from those activities. Using those responses, the researchers measured the older adults’ travel behaviors and travel satisfaction. Travel behaviors were measured using travel frequency, travel time, and travel distance. Travel satisfaction was measured on a scale with five options: dissatisfied, somewhat dissatisfied, neutral, somewhat satisfied, and satisfied. Watch the recording of a November 2023 webinar to learn about the findings in more detail.
The focus group was conducted with eighteen older adults who participated in the survey. The interviews were audio-recorded and analyzed to quantify transportation modes, current travel behaviors, future travel behaviors, and attitudes.
Several themes emerged from the survey and focus group:
The demographic factors with the most influence over frequency of travel were health and income; older adults who were in better health or had a higher income traveled more frequently.
Urban residence was associated with shorter travel time and distance compared to suburban or rural living.
Travel satisfaction was influenced by age, income, urban residence, health status, and use of assistive devices such as walkers. Overall health had the greatest positive correlation with travel satisfaction; usage of assistive devices had the greatest negative correlation.
Participants who used assistive equipment traveled a fewer number of times but spent more time on each excursion.
Survey participants traveled most for social activities.
To determine the accessibility of older adults, researchers
created catchment areas around supply-to-demand ratio, and
generated catchment areas around demand points and aggregating the supply-to-demand ratios from nearby supply points.
What does all that mean? For this project, a “catchment area” is a geographic region within which a person can travel in sixty minutes. “Supply” in “supply-to-demand” refers to a location that an older person might want to go to, and “demand” refers to where the older person lives.
The results of the accessibility calculation revealed that accessibility was lower in eastern and western suburbs than it was in the downtown area. Also, accessibility was higher for religion and recreation and lower for shopping. Importantly, the results of the accessibility calculation were based on a sample of relatively healthy older adults who still drive; specific populations with different needs require further attention.
Overall, the researchers found significant dissatisfaction and vulnerability in older adults with limited mobility. They documented a positive relationship between travel frequency and satisfaction up to a certain threshold, beyond which satisfaction declined. The results emphasize the importance of considering the diverse dimensions of older adults’ needs and developing distinct accessibility measures for groups that may find travel more difficult, such as those with disabilities or lower income.
In sum, the aging population is diverse, so accommodating them requires diverse solutions. A non-linear relationship exists between travel frequency and travel satisfaction, and that threshold warrants further investigation. Since this accessibility calculation only considered driving, taking multiple modes of travel into consideration would be useful in future work.
Photo by walencienne/iStock
