I knew that my friend, then in his late 80s, was having trouble seeing well. But I didn’t know the extent of his vision loss until he admitted one day that he couldn’t see the traffic lights when he drove. “My wife tells me when the light turns red or green,” he said. “If I’m alone, I just stop when other drivers stop. When they honk, then I know it’s green and I can go.”
As frightening and dangerous as this situation was, similar scenarios are likely to become more common as Colorado’s population ages and greater numbers of older drivers are on the streets. Recently, for example, a Lakewood man died at age 110; his son said the man drove until he was 108.
Last year, an Arvada Police Department task force analyzed auto accidents. It found that 13 percent of auto accidents in Arvada from 2003 through 2005 involved seniors. Worse, every fatal accident in the city during that time – 10 in all – involved drivers over 60 years old. The senior drivers were at fault in all but one of the fatalities.
“It was a wakeup call, a forecast of what the future will look like,” says Commander K. Foos of the Arvada Police Department. “If you project the growing number of seniors to 2020, a quarter of all accidents in our city will involve older drivers.”
As a result, the task force put together a special committee to focus on preventing traffic accidents involving seniors. The committee involved not only the Arvada Police Department and its citizen police academy alumni, but also senior organizations, insurance companies, recreation districts, the public schools and the Colorado Department of Motor Vehicles. Together, committee members developed a program they dubbed Survive-2-95.
Dave Fochtman, a volunteer who chairs the committee, says, “We know that taking away a parent’s car keys or driver’s license is difficult, and that even raising the issue with a parent is sensitive.” As a result, committee members assembled materials that contain strategies for talking about a senior’s driving. (They are available at city hall kiosks and through the police department’s Traffic Hot Line, 720-898-6806.)
The committee also saw that few seniors would voluntarily give up driving unless they had transportation options. So members researched alternatives and posted that information (“Arvada Rides”) on the city’s website and in widely disseminated brochures.
Teens are often vilified as bad drivers. But committee members reasoned that beginning drivers might have a lot in common with elders. So on two Saturdays earlier this year, Survive-2-95 paired 20 senior citizens with high school students for discussions about mutual driving concerns. Foos says the two groups share a common fear: freeway driving, which both find too fast and too congested. Seniors learned about the cellphones and other technology that distract student drivers, and the students were fascinated to learn that seniors began driving when cars had no seatbelts or automatic transmissions.
Most recently, Survive-2-95 has begun offering driving evaluations for seniors at the North Jefferson County Senior Recreation Center using a computerized program called “Road Wise Review.” The program helps seniors privately assess their own driving skills and is available for purchase from AAA.
(I, of course, am still an exemplary driver. At least that’s what I’ve been telling myself. But I reasoned that it wouldn’t hurt to try the test. To my surprise, I found parts of it more challenging than I would have anticipated.)
Foos points out that many seniors take steps to drive safely. They don’t drive at night, stay off of the interstates and take back roads to run errands. Still, the day may come when they are a hazard to themselves and others. Foos believes that the community must help them know when common sense dictates an end to driving.
Arvada is to be commended for taking the lead on a program to keep seniors – and those around them – safe. Other communities should establish similar models.
Susan Thornton (smthornton@aol.com) served 16 years on the Littleton City Council, including eight years as mayor.
