The Link between Elderly Travel Behavior and the Built Environment: A Case Study of Boston.
SHAN, BINGQIN.
2019
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The population of the elderly people has been rapidly rising in the United States according to U.S. Census Bureau. However, health and functional declines occur with age, including cognitive, visual and functional impairment, which could decrease the ability of elderly adults to drive safely, and therefore limit their outdoor activities. As a result, it is important to develop policies that encourage ... read morethe elderly to engage in out-of-home activities more frequently and safely, including age-friendly city/neighborhood design, as well as development of alternative mobility options. With the Boston metropolitan area as an example, this study analyzes elderly travel behavior, the built environment around their residence, and current mobility services and programs serving them. In this thesis, I first clustered and categorized the temporal travel patterns of the elderly population, based on the 2010/2011 Massachusetts Travel Survey (MTS). I then measured the relationship between travel modes and the built environment with data from the MTS, MBTA station and stop geographic information system (GIS) layers provided by MassGIS and the U.S. Census datasets. Lastly, by comparing current and past practices by age-friendly communities in the United States that encourage non-home activities for the elderly, as well as mobility options for safe and accessible travel, I aim to provide policy guidelines for planning agencies to develop programs to improve quality of life for the elderly population in the Boston metropolitan area.
Thesis (M.S.)--Tufts University, 2019.
Submitted to the Dept. of Urban and Environmental Policy and Planning.
Advisors: Shan Jiang, and Sheldon Krimsky.
Keywords: Urban planning, and Transportation.read less - ID:
- ww72bq738
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