Will NSW keep the elderly moving? Or will they stay stuck inside four walls?

Remember The Jetsons? A vision of the future where the transport itself was transportable — with the flying car collapsing into a suitcase after use. Genius! The cartoon sitcom was set in 2062, 39 years from now, and it doesn’t look like we will get anywhere near the flying car utopia of the 1960s. 

While flying cars may not be an actuality, we have been silently creating a transport infrastructure calamity over decades that when combined with a rapidly ageing population should be pulling us back into the present.

Australia is ageing and 32% of our older population lives in NSW. As people age, they need new ways to get around — that is, better alternatives to driving. 

In rural areas, where populations are older than average, where health is poorer than in the cities, and where public transport is scarce, the need to fill mobility gaps for older people is acute. In NSW, one in three elderly citizens live in rural and remote areas. Low-density communities can create significant mobility issues, leading to early and rapid declines in health. 

Saturday’s state election has provided a platform for both major parties to outline how they intend to help older people live active and healthy lives in their local community.

Policies to help older people maintain mobility might seem inconsequential in the context of a state election, but transport is not only a social determinant of health, it also affects almost every other social determinant. If the state government want to better manage its health budgets, it has to start factoring in the broader environmental aspects of ageing. 

I wonder what the Hanna-Barbera cartoonists would have made of the current plot lines?

The largest transport investments are in airports and roads, with tit-for-tat positions on how to prioritise rail investments, and a promise to think about better bus services. Dominic Perrottet’s Coalition government has committed to the Western Sydney Airport, which is already under way, and $1 billion to upgrade metropolitan and regional roads. 

On the other hand, the Chris Minns-led Labor Party has committed to a $60 weekly toll cap to help ease the burden of increasing tolls across Sydney and western Sydney. 

When it comes to public transport, the Coalition has committed to developing the City and South-West Metro. Labor plans to replace older trains, and has indicated a preference for trains to be built in NSW. This is in addition to completing only two of the four Sydney Metro train routes planned by the government. 

Labor has also committed to start building stage two of Parramatta light rail in its first term, and will establish an industry taskforce to assess the report’s findings and recommendations and improve bus services right across NSW.

In contrast, the Coalition has announced to waive bus driver authority fees, subsidise training course fees, and establish a recruitment taskforce to attract skilled bus drivers from overseas to address shortages.

For older people, and rural and regional communities in particular, it looks like another four years of procrastination — with little to no commitments by either major party to innovate transport systems or develop the appropriate infrastructure for urban, suburban and rural roads and public transport. 

It’s important to question the ideas embedded in policies such as “ageing in place” and “remaining independent”. Simply being in a place that enables you to age in place doesn’t always guarantee it’s the best or most suitable option. It could lead to a disconnection from social relationships and limited access to critical networks and services.

We know that social isolation — and loneliness — contributes to increased morbidity in older people, poorer people, and people living outside metropolitan areas. A loss of mobility will cause a subsequent increase in physical and mental health risk. Surely transport investments should focus as much on improving health outcomes and quality of life as much as it already does on economic productivity?

A government that can focus just slightly over the horizon would be working to design transport links that encourage interaction, increase personalised mobility options, and consultation mechanisms that involve older people in the co-production of transport plans that prioritise age-friendly solutions.

If the severe lack of investment in transport infrastructure for our ageing population continues, governments need to be accountable for the growing number older people who will be forced to live a life landlocked in their home with no way to escape. Because this will be the point at which the transport crisis becomes an all too costly and intractable health crisis.