Has our public transport failed the elderly?

A recent study has shown how the intuitive assumption that the elderly would be more likely to use public transport just does not hold true in Malta, Teodor Reljic finds

The comparatively weak uptake of public transport by those aged over 60 in Malta – the total population of which the authors quote as 93,758 based on a 2014 NSO report – is down to a mixture of personal habits, an aggressive car culture, as well as structural problems within the transport system as a whole
The comparatively weak uptake of public transport by those aged over 60 in Malta – the total population of which the authors quote as 93,758 based on a 2014 NSO report – is down to a mixture of personal habits, an aggressive car culture, as well as structural problems within the transport system as a whole

While the quality (or otherwise) of the local public transport system is often a source of contentious debate – when it isn’t a long drawn-out polemic, anyway – attention is often focused on the suitability of the service in and of itself, and how it affects the population as a whole.

What seems to be lacking, however, is a clearly targeted approach to the ongoing problems that beset the system, though a recent study has at least attempted to explore one angle of it – namely, how people over the age of 60 either take up or don’t take up public transport as a way of getting around the island.

Published in the October 2017 edition of the Journal of Transport Geography, the article ‘To drive or to use the bus? An exploratory study of older people in Malta’ by Deborah Mifsud, Maria Attard (University of Malta) and Stephen Ison (Loughborough University), showed how while an intuitive assumption based on research on other countries would suggest that the Maltese elderly should be expected to take up public transport in healthy numbers, the reality on the ground proves that this is simply not happening.

Based on their sample of 500, who were interviewed by phone over the course of 2016, the comparatively weak uptake of public transport by those aged over 60 in Malta – the total population of which the authors quote as 93,758 based on a 2014 NSO report – is down to a mixture of personal habits, an aggressive car culture, as well as structural problems within the transport system as a whole.

Giving up driving after 60: Main reasons given:

  • Health limitations (36%)
  • The perceived traffic and parking difficulties (31%)
  • Fear (11%)
  • Reliance on relatives (7%)
  • Additionally, 67% of those who decided to give up driving were females

Car trumps bus... every time

One of the most consistent strands of Mifsud, Attard and Ison’s study is the characterisation of the elderly public-transport user in Malta as being a “captive” user. Broadly speaking, this means that public transport is seen as something of a ‘last resort’ measure, especially for those who do not own a car, or who have stopped driving after reaching the age of 60, for a number of reasons (see box).

“The highest percentage of drivers (43.3%) used public transport in an infrequent manner, or else did not use it at all (41.2%). On the other hand, 23.6% of the non-drivers used public transport weekly compared to only 10.2% who were drivers. This shows that public transport usage was the highest among the non-drivers, meaning that these can potentially be captive-users,” the study reads. In other words, having access to a car and being fit and willing enough to drive it will almost always result in the car ‘winning’ over public transport. While the authors claim that further research will need to be done in order to pin down why the system remains somewhat unattractive to the elderly, they do suggest that “incentives and educational campaigns that encourage alternative modes of transport” could be the way forward, especially given what they recognise to be heavily “motorised ageing societies” like Malta.

The findings also noted a clear gender gap when it came to abandoning the car, with a total 67% of those who gave up driving being female.

Geography and society

Two other key factors identified by Mifsud, Attard and Ison in the study point to how geographic location and the individuals’ social lifestyle also determined the degree of public transport usage.

“Participation in social activities was a significant determinant for public transport use,” the authors claim, adding that “the odds for those who participated in social activities to use public transport weekly rather than never were almost three times more than for those who did not participate in any social activity”.

However, they do not interpret this as arising from any intrinsic positive factors within the transport system. Rather, the authors suggest that one “possible explanation” for this lies in the fact that those elderly people who engage in social activities in the first place would tend to belong to the healthier cohort among their group, “and thus feel more confident to use public transport”.

When it came to geographical distinction, the big one when it came to public transport usage was, quite simply, the distinction between Malta and Gozo – with public transport being taken up in an even more decreased capacity among those living on the smaller island.

“Public transport was used significantly less [in Gozo] than in the other districts in Malta,” according to the authors. “For example, the odds that older people residing in the Western district used public transport on a monthly manner compared to never using it were four times more likely than those living in Gozo”.

Less likely to drive

The picture that Mifsud, Attard and Ison’s study paints of the Maltese public transport system as a whole is not exactly a flattering one. Perhaps it cuts deeper than any typical take-down of ‘the buses’ in Malta – which, let’s face it, is also something of a national past-time – because of its specific choice of focus: that of the elderly, which in turn means a focus on some of society’s most vulnerable individuals. Individuals who should, for all intents and purposes, be encouraged and helped along by a well-oiled public transport system that works to make their lives easier.

Given how the study also found that the older one gets, the less likely they are to drive – “for every one year increase in age, the odds of being a driver is reduced by 7.4%” – one would assume that a higher take-up of public transport in old age would be a given.

“However, in Malta this did not prove to be the case since public transport usage was, overall, low,” the authors state.

“This shows that public transport in Malta is not yet catering enough for the older-old since they may still prefer to travel by car – particularly as passengers.”