How Does Age Impact Multi-Modal Choices?
The word “transportation” brings to mind different modes — bus, train, biking, driving, etc. Being multi-modal, then, means mixing these different modes together in one trip. While this is great in theory because it supports sustainable mobility, how well it is adopted varies not just with age, but when exactly someone is born. Someone who is 35 in 2020 will have different transportation preferences than someone who was 35 in 2010.
In “When you are born matters: An age-period-cohort analysis of multimodality,” An et al. looked at an 11-year travel survey from England to better understand how the age of an individual, the socio-environmental context they grow up in, and historical events like economic recessions influence one’s decision to make multi-modal trips. One distinguishing finding was that multi-modality was the least likely among baby boomers. While characteristics such as limited physical mobility and decreasing need to commute are valid factors in contributing to less multi-modal trips, the study correlates the lack of multi-modality to the “distinctive early life conditions and formative experience” baby boomers experienced. In this US and Western Europe, post-World War II was the “golden age of capitalism”, which for transportation meant cheaper gas and more automobiles.
What does this mean for today’s transportation? An et al. write: “Studies have suggested that youth is an impressionable period when individuals are highly susceptible to the influence of the social context, and on this basis, their worldviews, values, and beliefs can be substantially shaped.” What is today’s transportation and urban landscape telling the youth? What socio-economic factors are shaping their attitude towards different forms of mobility?
In addition, this study also highlights the wide variety of factors that influence an individual’s decision to make multi-modal trips. Those who tended to be more multi-modal included: females, students, do not have a full-time job, have a higher household income, own a bicycle, live in self-owned housing, and more. But what are the proactive ways to get more people to practice multi-modality and as a result, engage in sustainable mobility? Without multi-modality, individuals will likely end up with a private automobile because in an auto-dependent society, this mode can meet virtually all transportation needs.
