Travel habit creation of the elderly and the transition to sustainable transport: Exploratory research based on a retrospective survey

ABSTRACT

Transport researchers have identified a low propensity to use nonmotorized travel modes among retired people and associated concerns about road safety risks and obesity. This exploratory research examines the creation of driving habits during the life stages and the contextual factors that affect the travel mode choices of retired people. Retrospective, semistructured interviews with 37 retired people were undertaken in a low-density city of Canberra, Australia. Analysis of recorded data from the survey provides an example of mobility narratives organized around five hypotheses. Most respondents obtained a driver's license as soon as possible, despite many reporting favorable experiences of using public transport when young. The need to move from place to place for work and children's activities reinforces driving habits. This occurs especially in low-density environments such as Canberra where public transport cannot fulfill their needs. Once the driving habit is created it is retained well into retirement, and the preference is to keep driving independently as long as physical ability allows. In older age, some respondents self-limit their driving distances and avoid peak hours and night-time driving to minimize the safety risk. The conclusions contain research implications that explore the best opportunities to mainstream sustainable transport in an aging society. In addition to licensing and public transport issues, we argue that the fundamental challenge for sustainability remains how transport systems could be designed to support the needs of every generation, to minimize later dependence on the automobile.

KEYWORDS:

• Driving habit
• life stage
• mobility narratives
• public transport
• retrospective survey
• travel behavior

Acknowledgments

The authors thank anonymous reviewers for their constructive comments on two earlier drafts of this article.

Notes

¹ “The quality of life in your city and living environment questionnaire survey” was conducted during the period of May–August 2012 by the first author and approved by the University of Canberra Human Ethics Committee (Project No. 12–86). The survey included questions on satisfaction with access to public transport, quality of public transport, and willingness to reduce car travel.

² These people were mostly born between 1946 and 1965 (so-called baby boomers) and are the biggest demographic cohort in Australian society (Quine & Carter 2006).

³ Dargay (2001) explained the reason as “household become accustomed to owning cars and convenience that they afford” (p. 813).

⁴ By using the life-course calendar, Schoenduwe et al. (2015) demonstrated in Switzerland that rich information can be collected to explore key life events and travel behavior.

⁵ This figure was calculated by the first author based on the smart card data of the public transport users collected on weekdays of June 2012 by the ACT government.

⁶ The criteria applied in choosing interview participants also included “raised family” because the literature (Section 2.1) suggested that having child(ren) significantly influences travel mode choice. “Semiretired” includes people who are winding down work commitment as retirement age is approaching or are still working casually or are in part-time employment after retirement.

⁷ The Australian Social Trends data shows in 1976, when most of the participants were raising a family, 60% of families were made of couples with children. This fell to 50% by 1996 (Australian Bureau of Statistics, 2001).

⁸ Include Brisbane, Sydney, Canberra, Melbourne, Adelaide, Perth, and Hobart.

⁹ Following the qualitative research procedure, this article provides comments about the narratives that emerge from the data analysis (Creswell, 2009). All quotes are genuinely extracted verbatim from the interview tapes and there has been no attempt to correct the grammar of the spoken word, following a typical qualitative procedure.

¹⁰ Represented by the explanatory codes.