Aging Demographics in Medium-Sized Cities: Case Study of Travel Behavior in Kamloops, Canada
In western countries, the imminent aging of the baby boomer generation will have significant impacts on the function and sustainability of transportation systems. While the demographic shift of larger cities will be mitigated by the in-migration of younger residents, smaller cities will experience a sharper increase in median age due to the out-migration of younger residents. This outlook, coupled with the existing auto-oriented culture in medium-sized cities, presents a unique set of transportation sustainability challenges for smaller communities. In the Canadian context, the effects of the aging demographic on transportation demand have received surprisingly little attention, and, though the demographic change will be most pronounced in smaller cities, the existing literature is focused on large cities. Given this, this paper serves to research the effects of age on travel behavior in the medium sized city of Kamloops, British Columbia. From the city’s household travel survey data, it is found that significant travel behavior differences exist between different age cohorts. The empirical behavior analysis is supplemented with the city’s population projections for each age cohort to demonstrate the future transportation impacts of the aging demographics. Though transit ridership in the city is lacking and an increase in older residents is shown to perpetuate this problem, the analysis indicates that the city is well positioned to push for increasing active mode shares into the future.
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Supplemental Notes:
- This paper was sponsored by TRB committee ADD20 Social and Economic Factors of Transportation.
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Corporate Authors:
500 Fifth Street, NW
Washington, DC United States 20001 -
Authors:
- Toop, Erin
- Harmon, Adam
- Miller, Eric J
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Conference:
- Transportation Research Board 92nd Annual Meeting
- Location: Washington DC, United States
- Date: 2013-1-13 to 2013-1-17
- Date: 2013
Language
- English
Media Info
- Media Type: Digital/other
- Features: Figures; References; Tables;
- Pagination: 14p
- Monograph Title: TRB 92nd Annual Meeting Compendium of Papers
Subject/Index Terms
- TRT Terms: Aging (Biology); Case studies; Demographics; Medium sized cities; Surveys; Travel behavior
- Uncontrolled Terms: Household travel surveys
- Geographic Terms: Kamloops (Canada)
- Subject Areas: Highways; Planning and Forecasting; Public Transportation; Society; I72: Traffic and Transport Planning;
Filing Info
- Accession Number: 01472791
- Record Type: Publication
- Report/Paper Numbers: 13-2101
- Files: TRIS, TRB, ATRI
- Created Date: Feb 19 2013 8:53AM