Flickr user Gerry Labrijn (cc)
Piazza Torquato Tasso in Sorrento, Italy is brimming with activity. Integral to fostering a lively community is planning for all age groups.
By Brad Winick, adjunct professor, Urban Planning and Public Affairs, University of Illinois at Chicago - October 9, 2014
I’m thinking about visiting a wonderful community, complete with a range of affordable lodging options, an extensive local transportation network, lovely and safe open spaces and natural areas, diverse cultural amenities, accessible commercial opportunities, convenient health care resources and reliable and well-maintained public infrastructure. Doesn’t it sound like I am imagining a dream vacation to an exotic overseas destination?
Yes, these are the types of characteristics that many of us seek in our vacation planning, but in this instance I am envisioning a local livable community similar to those laid out in the Chicago Metropolitan Agency for Planning’s GO TO 2040 Comprehensive Regional Plan.
Did you notice that my ideal community includes components that will go a great distance toward meeting the needs of our aging population, without suggesting that these key characteristics specifically benefit older adults?
This is my point. The characteristics that support older adults’ ability to age successfully in their communities, and the characteristics that make those communities livable and desirable to people of all ages and circumstances, are often one and the same. A recent survey by the American Planning Association shows that Millennial respondents (ages 21 to 34) and older adults (ages 50 to 65, referred to in the survey document as “Active Boomers”) have very similar priorities in what they seek in a community. Both groups strongly prefer communities (urban, suburban, rural and small towns alike) with mobility options, walkability, easily accessed amenities, affordability and a strong sense of place.
Flickr user Andrew Seaman (cc)
Giddings Plaza in Chicago's Lincoln Square neighborhood
This is not to say that we should plan, develop and operate our communities without keeping a specific eye on the evolving needs of the aging population, as their needs are real and significant. As articulated in the recently released study by Joint Center for Housing Studies of Harvard University entitled Housing America’s Older Adults, our country’s existing housing stock is unprepared to meet the growing need for affordable, accessible housing for older adults; our communities do not currently provide aging-supportive transportation and pedestrian infrastructure; and we lack adequate links between housing and health care to support older adults’ abilities to successfully and healthfully age in their communities. In addition, older adults are more likely to require community accommodations ranging from the presence of opportunities to facilitate social engagement and combat isolation, to community-based chronic disease management and other healthcare and fitness programs.
Instead, planning our communities with a specific eye on the needs of our aging population—much like we keep early childhood development, water resources or public transit in mind—would add a similar richness and sense of ownership to the locally appropriate plans that come from such broad-based processes.
Homes for a Changing Region is one method communities can use to think about these issues. Developed by the Chicago Metropolitan Agency for Planning, Metropolitan Planning Council (MPC) and Metropolitan Mayors Caucus, Homes helps communities understand what their residents will want 20 years from now.
The upcoming MPC Roundtable entitled Planning for the Aging of Chicagoland's Communities on Thursday, Oct. 23, will provide a great opportunity to interact with a roomful of interested stakeholders who represent many of the sectors and perspectives active in this conversation. I look forward to seeing you there and hearing about the types of livable communities that you envision supporting your own evolving aging-in-community needs and desires. Because, after all, aren’t tomorrow’s aging-in-community needs and desires very much like today’s living-in-community ones?
Register today for the MPC Roundtable “Planning for the Aging of Chicagoland’s Communities."
Brad Winick, AICP, LEED AP, is an Adjunct Professor at UIC’s College of Urban Planning and Public Affairs, where he teaches a graduate Urban Planning and Public Health course on planning healthy communities for an aging population, and a Board Director of AgeOptions (The Area Agency on Aging of Suburban Cook County). He also founded and runs Planning/Aging, a consultancy dedicated to helping communities plan for their aging populations.