This paper compares North American experiences to European ones in order to assist European policymakers to better understand both the transitional and the long-term transportation policy and planning implications of an ageing society. This paper adopts an alternative way to evaluate the full dimensions of the sometimes profound societal forces which will shape the transportation patterns of the elderly in the next half century. A three-part analytical structure is suggested for identifying and then evaluating the complex forces which have created the travel needs of older people today. This paper uses those three factors to illuminate the future: (a) Age effects - those that come as the result of the physical ageing process; (b) Cohort effects - those that result when sub-sets (or cohorts) of the population share a common experience over a period of time, an experience not shared by other population cohorts which came before or after; and (c) Period effects - those which impact everyone in the population at the same time. Most public policies and natural disasters fall into this category. (A)
Samenvatting