Smart Road Safety for Aging Population

Data in Greece shows that elderly citizens account for 29% of total road fatalities and 58% of that occurs in the urban areas. Physical vulnerabilities and functional limitation of their age makes the elderly population susceptible to this road fatalities. Vardaki et al. advocated for better road design that promotes the safety for road users that are older in age. 

Road design should take account of how elderly may process decision making on the road slower thus managing the workload for road users are critical. Clear, visible and great legibility of signage becomes important part of the road design. There should also be long enough distance to give appropriate time for calculating decision on the road is one way cities can make road safer for the aging population. Road layout should also be “self-explanatory” that transition and changes should be design to be as intuitive as possible, this is to ensure that road design exploit the intuitive driving for the elder road users. Lastly, these road safety initiatives should be implemented consistently throughout the road networks to simplify the driving process for the elderly. 

Reference

Vardaki, S., & Kanellaidis, G. Aspects of Safe Road Design for Aging Road Users.

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