Women’s Issues in Transportation: Summary of the 4th International Conference, Volume 2: Technical Papers (2011)

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134 Driving Miss Daisy Older Women as Passengers Nancy McGuckin, Travel Behavior Analyst Heather Contrino, Federal Highway Administration Hikari (Yuki) Nakamoto, SAS Programmer Adella Santos, Cambridge Systematics Nondrivers are a growing segment of the older popu- lation, creating a fundamental mobility challenge for larger and larger numbers of older Americans in the United States and a looming policy and planning chal- lenge. Women are twice as likely to be nondrivers as are men of the same age. Although women are 60% of the population 65 years of age and older, they are 75% of the nondrivers. This study focuses on older nondriving women and examines their living arrange- ments and their travel as passengers in vehicles. The study found that although older women drive about 60% of men’s miles, they travel 85% as many miles in vehicles as do men—more often as passengers. Because of longevity, driving confidence, and medical problems, the number of women who cease driving is far larger than the number of men. Many households with nondriving women are located in suburban and rural areas, far from transit and other options. Finally, the study found that nondriving women are heavily dependent on family and friends for rides, especially women who live alone or with another nondriver. This research shows that when an older woman non- driver is a passenger on a vehicle trip, three out of 10 times she is traveling with nonhousehold members. A combination of factors, including suburbanization, extended longevity, and the increase in older women who live alone, will challenge communities to provide safe mobility for people who can no longer drive. Pol- icy and planning suggestions are discussed. in the movie Driving Miss Daisy (1989), set in the 1950s, Jessica Tandy plays the role of an aging woman who lives alone in her old family home in Atlanta. When it becomes clear that she can no longer safely drive to the store or social activities, her son (played by Dan Aykroyd), busy with his career and family, hires some- one to drive her a couple of days a week. The driver (Morgan Freeman) takes the job because he himself is newly retired, slightly bored, and could use the money. The movie provided some insight into a growing social issue. Many older people want to stay in the homes they know as long as possible—they age in place. Older women who stop driving, especially older white women, often live alone in suburban or rural areas far from tran- sit and other transportation options. Although this is not exclusively a “white women” transportation issue, the data show that people of color are more likely to live in urban areas, closer to transit. Although African- American women are as likely as whites to live alone, Hispanic and Asian women more often live with others in the household. it has been 20 years since Driving Miss Daisy first appeared on the big screen, and now the issue of aging drivers has become the focus of more and more planning and safety initiatives. However, the challenge of how to provide mobility options for older nondrivers is still vex- ing and becoming more and more critical as the size of the older population grows. Currently, there are approx- imately 5 million people over the age of 65 who are not licensed drivers. By 2020 that number will nearly double

135DRiviNG MiSS DAiSY: OLDER WOMEN AS PASSENGERS to 9.5 million. For people who no longer drive, traveling to the store or the doctor’s office or visiting friends and family is difficult, creating a risk for unmet needs, care, and social isolation. Often a health issue forces older women to reduce their day-to-day travel, depend on others for rides, and finally cease driving. According to the 2009 National Household Travel Survey (NHTS), 6.4 million women have a medical condition that makes it difficult to travel (29% of all women 65 and older). Of these women, 84% have reduced their day-to-day travel, 49% limit driving to daytime, and 61% rely on others for rides. This is con- sistent with early research that has identified transporta- tion service as a major component of elder care offered by adult children of elderly parents (Nichols and Junk 1997). This research finds that older nondriving women are heavily dependent on their husbands, first, then on non-household members, to help meet their daily mobil- ity needs. Still, the lack of mobility for nondriving older women is extremely high. According to the 2009 NHTS, more than half of nondriving older women did not leave the house on their assigned travel day.1 This dearth of travel is not by choice; about half of these nontravelers have not made a trip in the past week and would like to get out more. These new data are the first indication of unmet mobility needs among the older population at a national level. The NHTS data series provides a unique source of information on the characteristics of older women’s travel, and the large sample of U.S. households allows one to analyze specific segments of the older women non- driver population. This paper begins with an overview of 1 The NHTS assigns a random travel day to report travel for all household members. Nontravelers did not make a single trip on that assigned travel day. trends in women’s travel and then looks at demographic factors (household size, income, and race) for older women drivers and nondrivers. Following that, house- hold and mobility patterns are explored for nondriving women, by race and ethnicity. Finally, the vehicle occu- pant characteristics are examined to see who is driving when older women are passengers. Conclusions include a summary of the findings as well as thoughts on future research directions. Trends in Women’s overall Travel Behavior Women of all ages drive fewer miles than men—on average women drive just 60% of the miles men drive. vehicle miles of travel (vMT) is attributed to the driver’s characteristics, so if a man and a woman are traveling together in a vehicle and the man is driving, the vMT for that trip is attributed to the man. Often, vMT is con- fused with travel in vehicles, so in this paper the terms “driver miles” and “person miles” are used to express miles of travel in private vehicles. in regard to person miles of travel in vehicles, whether as a driver or as a passenger, men travel many more miles alone [single-occupancy vehicle (SOv)], whereas women travel slightly more miles in vehicles with more than one person [multioccupant vehicle (MOv)]. in total, women travel about 85% of the miles that men travel in vehicles (person miles of travel), as shown in Figure 1. Although women of all ages drive fewer miles on average than men of the same age, trends indicate that women are narrowing the gap. in 1977 young women drivers (ages 20 to 34) drove 42% of the miles that men of the same age drove, but by 2009 young women drove 73% of young men’s miles. Figure 2 shows the trends in Driver Miles Miles in SOV 9,721 5,976 6,027 3,791 Men Women 6,472 6,745 12,772 10,263 Miles in MOV Total PMT in Vehicles FIGURE 1 Women’s and men’s annual miles in SOV and MOV travel and total person miles of travel (PMT) in vehicles. (Source: 2009 NHTS.)

136 WOMEN’S iSSUES iN TRANSPORTATiON, vOLUME 2 driver miles of women in four age groups as a percent of men in the same age group. Social norms, employment levels among women, and other factors (such as the increased number of licensed women) have resulted in increased vehicle travel among women of all ages. Those young women who were 20 to 34 years old in 1977 are 51 to 65 years old today. in 1977 the average young woman drove just 6,500 mi per year, whereas in 2009 the same cohort (now 51 to 65 years old) drive 9,600 mi—nearly 50% more. And young women in 2009 (the older women of tomorrow) drive 11,650 mi per year, almost twice as much as the young women 30 years ago. Looking forward, the higher mobility expectations of the younger cohorts of women will play out as they age, possibly adding to increased driver miles by women. Women’s total travel in vehicles is much higher than their driver miles would indicate. The reason is that women of all ages are more likely to be sitting in the passenger seat when a couple travels together in a vehi- cle. The NHTS shows that eight out of 10 times when couples of any age travel together on a vehicle trip, the man drives. Taking the role of passenger can contribute to a lack of confidence and practice in driving—referred to as effi- cacy. Rosenbloom notes that this is part of the reason older women have difficulty taking over driving respon- sibilities when their husbands can no longer drive (2003). in addition, lack of confidence may lead older women to give up driving prematurely, even when they have the ability to continue. Further research on the character- istics of shared vehicle trips might explore different age cohorts to see whether younger ages follow the norm of “letting” men drive when couples travel together. household size, income, and race Living arrangements may influence driving cessation because elderly people may be more willing to give up driving if they live with a driver (Rosenbloom 2004). According to the NHTS, women 65 and older who do not drive are twice as likely as older women who drive to live in larger households—a total of 28.9% of older women nondrivers live in households with three or more family members (15.8% in three-person households and 13.1% in households of four or more). in comparison, 8.1% of driving women 65 or older live in households with three or more persons (Figure 3). As this research will indicate, the household composition is co-related with race/ethnicity. For older women who do not live alone, the other household member is often a driver. Table 1 shows the percent of households for nondriving older women by whether the household contains at least one driver. Of all older women who do not drive, the majority live in a household with at least one driver. This supports the idea that women may be more willing to give up driving if they live in a household with another driver. However, almost 40% of nondriving older women live alone. Of the 31.2% of two-person households that include a nondriving older woman, nearly one out of six (17.6%) have no drivers at all. Larger households are more likely to contain a driver, but 7.8% and 6.6% 80 60 40 20 0 1977 1983 1990 1995 2001 2009 Young drivers (20–34) Highly mobile (35–54) Preretirement (55–64) W o m e n ’s M ile s as D riv e rs a s a P e rc e n t o f M en ’s Older drivers (≥ 65) FIGURE 2 Trends in women’s driver miles as a percentage of men’s. (Source: NHTS data series.)

137DRiviNG MiSS DAiSY: OLDER WOMEN AS PASSENGERS of the three- and four-person households of nondriving women have no other driver in the household. Significant variations in both household size and driv- ing status exist by race and ethnicity. For example, Table 2 shows that 29.5% of all African-American households with a woman 65 years old or older are single-person households, and within those households nearly half are women who drive and half are women who do not drive. in contrast, Asian women are less likely to live alone, and if they do they are more likely drivers—21.2% of Asian households with a woman 65 years old or older are single-person households, and within those more than two-thirds of the older women are drivers. White women are the most likely to live alone—36% in single-person households—and the most likely to be a driver; 77.8% of those women drive. Asian and Hispanic older women are more likely to live in larger households—31.5% and 25.7% of all Asian and Hispanic households with an older woman have four or more people. in contrast, only 5.4% of white house- holds that have an older woman include four or more total family members. Older women of color may have greater mobility and access to goods and services as they age and cease driving because of the support of extended family and other household members. There are also economic benefits to living with other family members, as shown by the estimated mean income of households with older women who do not drive. Fig- ure 4 shows that Hispanic older women who do not drive live in households with about the same income as other Hispanic households, but African-American older women who do not drive live in households with much less income than other African-American households. As well as living in poorer households, women who do not drive are more likely than the general population to live in urban areas. Table 3 is based on the 2001 NHTS because the geocoded transit stop locations are not yet available on the 2009 data set. Just over three-quarters (78%) of all households in the 2001 NHTS sample are in an urban area, but 85% of households with an older woman who does not drive are located in urban areas. Of those households in an urbanized area, Table 3 shows the distance to transit for households with an older woman who drives and households with an older woman who does not drive, again by race and ethnic category because these variables are highly correlated. One-person HH Percent of all HHs (census) 25.8% 32.6% 16.5% 25.0% HH size of women 65+ who don’t drive 39.9% 31.2% 15.8% 13.1% HH size of women 65+ who drive 41.0% 50.9% 5.2% 2.9% Two-person HH Three-person HH Four-person or more HH 80 60 40 30 20 10 0 Pe rc e n t FIGURE 3 Household size distribution of older women drivers and nondrivers (HH = household). TABLE 1 Households of Nondriving Older Women by Whether the Household Contains at Least One Driver Percentage of Households Drivers Within Household One Person Two Persons Three Persons Four or More Persons All None 100.0 17.6 7.8 6.6 47.5 At least one 0 82.4 92.2 93.4 52.5 Percent of all 39.9 31.2 15.8 13.1 100.0

138 WOMEN’S iSSUES iN TRANSPORTATiON, vOLUME 2 For example, Table 3 shows that 66% of all Afri- can-American households in urban areas are within 0.25 mi of a bus line, but 78.7% of African-American urban households that include an older woman who does not drive are located within 0.25 mi of a bus line. in contrast, only 40.4% of white households in urban areas are located within 0.25 mi of a bus line, and only 53.2% of white urban households with an older woman who does not drive are located within 0.25 mi of a bus line. drivinG cessaTion and unmeT moBiliTy needs Altogether, nearly three times as many older women are nondrivers than older men—5.7 million women com- pared with 1.8 million men. in each age decade after 65, twice as many women as men are nondrivers—15% of women and 7% of men 65 to 74 years old are nondriv- ers, 30% of women and 13% of men 75 to 84 years old are nondrivers, and 60% of women and 30% of men 85 years old and older are nondrivers. But some older TABLE 2 Proportion of Households with Older Women, by Family Size and Race–Ethnicity Distribution of Women Woman is Woman is Race–Ethnicity Household Size Ages ≥65 (%) a Driver (%) a Nondriver (%) African American 1 29.5 49.4 50.6 2 40.6 58.8 41.2 3 15.0 29.6 70.4 ≥4 14.9 54.2 45.8 All 100.0 Asian 1 21.2 67.8 32.2 2 25.8 65.1 34.9 3 21.6 37.4 62.6 ≥4 31.5 15.7 84.3 All 100.0 Hispanic of any race 1 20.5 50.6 49.4 2 36.6 60.1 39.9 3 17.3 33.2 66.8 ≥4 25.7 20.3 79.7 All 100.0 White, non-Hispanic 1 36.0 77.8 22.2 2 51.1 81.1 19.0 3 8.4 57.0 43.0 ≥4 4.5 47.8 52.2 All 100.0 Note: Detail may not add to total because of rounding. Est. mean income of HHs that include a woman age ≥65 who does not drive $27,596 $15,358 $33,237 $38,011 $29,161 Est. mean income of HHs that do not include a woman age ≥65 who does not drive $52,716 $37,084 $37,024 $54,227 $57,196 Es tim at ed M ea n In co m e ($) 60,000 50,000 40,000 30,000 20,000 10,000 0 70,000 All African American Hispanic Asian Whilte FIGURE 4 Estimated mean household income by older women’s driver–nondriver status and race– ethnicity. Women nondrivers live in poorer households overall, with variation by race–ethnicity.

139DRiviNG MiSS DAiSY: OLDER WOMEN AS PASSENGERS women have never driven, and some have ceased driving. The 2009 NHTS added a question to determine whether nondrivers had ever driven. Older men nondrivers are far more likely to have driven in the past—only one out of 10 never drove. in contrast, 40% of older women who currently do not drive never did; 60% have ceased driving. As they age more than twice as many women cease driving as men— for example about 600,000 men 75 to 85 years old have ceased driving compared with 1.3 million women in the same age group (see Figure 5). The limited mobility for nondriving older women is striking—more than half of nondriving women (52.4%) report staying at home all day compared with fewer than one out of five driving women. About half of those who stayed home all day say that they would like to get out more. TravelinG WiTh family and friends Women’s role as passengers in vehicles has been well explored in safety analysis, underscored by the fact that women, especially in the front passenger seat, have differ- ent risks during crashes. Limited travel behavior research and research by gerontologists, along with anecdotal evi- dence, reflect the codriving experience of older drivers, such as spouses assisting each other with driving. One interesting study looked specifically at the safety of older drivers with passengers in the vehicle. Although the num- ber of passengers for teenage drivers is associated with more crashes, older drivers had fewer crashes at night when carrying two or more passengers (Hing, Stamatia- das, and Aultman-Hall 2003). A specific goal was to look at who was driving older women passengers—the mythical Miss Daisy. in the fol- TABLE 3 Urban Households by Race–Ethnicity and Distance to a Bus Line Distance to Transit (%) Race–Ethnicity Household Characteristics 0–0.25 mi 0.26–0.5 mi 0.51–1.0 mi >1 mi African American Without older women 65.2 6.8 4.6 23.4 With older women who drive 74.2 7.6 0.6 17.6 With older women who do not drive 78.7 2.5 0.3 18.5 Percent of all African-American urban households 66.0 6.7 4.3 23.1 Asian Without older women 64.1 9.2 7.2 19.5 With older women who drive 68.7 2.0 2.0 27.3 With older women who do not drive 64.3 2.9 6.3 26.6 Percent of all Asian urban households 64.2 9.0 7.1 19.7 Hispanic Without older women 60.2 10.7 5.2 24.0 With older women who drive 60.9 7.8 6.8 24.5 With older women who do not drive 77.8 7.1 1.8 13.4 Percent of all Hispanic urban households 60.5 10.6 5.1 23.8 White Without older women 40.0 9.8 8.6 41.7 With older women who drive 41.9 10.1 7.6 40.4 With older women who do not drive 53.2 7.7 5.6 33.5 Percent of all white urban households 40.4 9.8 8.4 41.4 Note: Detail may not add to total because of rounding. Source: 2001 National Household Travel Survey. Men Women 65–74 75–84 ≥85 65–74 75–84 ≥85 2,500,000 2,000,000 1,500,000 1,000,000 500,000 0 Ceased drivingNever drove FIGURE 5 Number of nondrivers by whether they ceased driving and by age and sex.

140 WOMEN’S iSSUES iN TRANSPORTATiON, vOLUME 2 lowing analysis, which includes vehicle trips made by all older women, regardless of driving status, an attempt is made to discern the relationship of the woman passenger to the driver on the trip. in the NHTS, the household respondent can be any person 18 or older who agrees during the recruit to participate. Because the relationship of everyone in the household is coded to the household respondent, the analysis is complicated. As an example, say the household respondent is a 50-year-old male. He reports that the 75-year-old woman in his household is his “mother.” When the vehicle trip is examined, the mother is being driven by the “spouse”— but this description would fit her daughter-in-law (who is the spouse of the household respondent), not her. Figure 6 shows the relationship of the driver to women passengers 65 years of age and older. in the majority of vehicle trips (58.2%) the husband drives, but non-household members drive for a significant percentage of trips (30.9%). Data from Statistics Canada show that men are much more likely to provide transportation to an older relative, whereas women overwhelmingly provide more personal and in-home care (Williams 2004). This research finds that daughters that live in the household drive twice as often as sons, and other female relatives drive more often than other male relatives, although the percentage of trips for both is small. summary and furTher research needs Trends in women’s travel indicate that older women are driving more than comparable women in the past. But this research found that women of all ages “let” their husbands drive when couples travel together. This social norm may have negative effects when older women must take on the responsibility of driving themselves—they may not feel confident and able to continue driving. Further research could look at age cohort effects, worker status, life cycle, and individual auto ownership, as well as race and ethnic- ity, to see whether there are variations. Older women are living alone at historically unprec- edented rates. Older nondriving women who live alone have the lowest household income, especially African- American women, which may limit their options for alternative transportation and their access to goods and services that might be delivered to the household. Asian and Hispanic older women nondrivers tend to live in larger households—but a fair proportion of those larger households do not contain another driver. Access to goods and services is hard to measure, but the NHTS 2001 measures the distance from the household to the closest bus or rail line (this has not yet been coded on the 2009 data set). A large percentage of households that include an older, nondriving woman, especially white households, are located more than 1 mi from the closest transit service. This is far for an older woman to walk and also may affect the availability of special transit services (that serve the same area as public transit). in addition, being far from transit may also indicate that fewer oppor- tunities, such as shops, libraries, clinics, and restaurants, are within walking distance. Further research could link women in communities with the local transportation ser- vices and measure the activities within walking distance. Who Drives When an Older Woman Is a Passenger? 0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 Unrelated HH member Other male relative Other female relative Son drives Daughter drives Non-HH Member Husband drives Percent of passenger trips 1.1% 2.0% 3.6% 2.4% 4.1% 30.9% 58.2% Unrelated HH member Other male relative Other female relative Son drives Daughter drives Non-HH member Husband drives FIGURE 6 Relationship of driver to older women passengers.

141DRiviNG MiSS DAiSY: OLDER WOMEN AS PASSENGERS if nondrivers live far from transit and live alone or with other nondrivers, they depend on friends and fam- ily for rides. in nearly six out of 10 vehicle trips in which an older woman is the passenger her husband drives, but three out of 10 trips have a non-household member as the driver. information about these non-household members (relationship, age, sex) would help in gaining an understanding of the role of family, friends, and the community in support of older women’s mobility. Mobility is a key component of one’s independence in the United States, but mobility, as measured by trips or miles per day, is an extremely imperfect estimate of how free and able an individual is to conduct daily activities outside the house (as Rosenbloom and Winsten-Bartlett point out) (1997). Likewise, typical single-day travel sur- veys (“snapshot” surveys) are a poor way to estimate the immobile or “shut-in” population that is suffering because of a lack of mobility. if an individual did not travel on the assigned day, it is virtually impossible to discern whether the person stayed home by choice or was unable to leave. The 2009 NHTS obtained new data to help define unmet mobility needs, especially in the older population. The results show that older women, particularly those who do not drive, desire to get out more. More than half of nondriving older women do not leave the house on a given day, and about half of these women would like to get out more. These new data are the first indication of unmet mobility needs at a national level. it is found that as society ages, mobility and access are impaired for a growing portion of the population. When older people give up driving, personal independence, social connection, and economic engagement can suffer. 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142 WOMEN’S iSSUES iN TRANSPORTATiON, vOLUME 2 Marotolli, R. A., C. F. Mendes de Leon, T. A. Glass, L. M. Cooney, Jr., L. F. Berkman, and M. E. Tinetti. 1997. Driving Cessation and increased Depressive Symptoms: Prospective Evidence from the New Haven EPESE. Journal of the Ameri- can Geriatrics Society, vol. 45, No. 2, pp. 202–206. Rosenbloom, S. 1995. Travel of Elderly, Nationwide Personal Transportation Survey. Demographic Special Reports. Report FHWA-PL-95-032. FHWA, U.S. Department of Transportation, Washington, D.C.