Hong Kong stands ready to meet the transport needs of the aging population?

Abstract

While population ageing is happening in many cities around the world, Hong Kong is also facing the same problem as the proportion of elderly population has been rapidly increased over the past decades and the figure is expected to double in 20 years. Although the government has been aware of the associated impacts on labour productivity, social welfare and healthcare system arising from population ageing, there was a lack of discussion and focus on the transport needs of elderly persons in Hong Kong over the past decades. The rapid ageing trend may result in serious transport and associated social problems if the transport needs of elderly persons could not be catered due to unavailability of transport services and facilities. While most policy makers usually emphasize the role of money to encourage elderly persons to engage in social activities through implementation of fare concessionary scheme, development of an accessible, safe, comfortable and inclusive transportation system is also essential to help elderly persons to move in the city independently, and to determine their participation in the community and accessibility to the social and health services. In this regard, this Study targets to fill such research gap in Hong Kong and a qualitative approach was adopted in this study. A total number of seven interview surveys and two focus group interviews with different stakeholders were conducted to identify the transport needs of elderly persons and the difficulties they encountered. A literature review on the transport policies in Singapore and the concept of age-friendly transport initiated by the World Health Organization were also selected as a case study and research framework respectively for evaluation of transport policies and measures implemented in Hong Kong. Based on the research findings, this paper makes recommendations to improve the transport policy making and policy implementation process as well as the existing transport measures in Hong Kong with the goals of meeting the transport needs of elderly persons in relation to rapid population ageing, and development of an inclusive and age-friendly transport system and society in the long run. Potential challenges from political, economic and social aspects while implementing the recommendations in Hong Kong are also identified in this study.