Talking, walking, riding and driving: The mobilities of older adults

Through interviews with residents of an urban retirement community and users of a senior centre in an inner city neighbourhood this research uses the new mobilities paradigm to examine the relationships that exist between movement, non-movement, communicative travel and place-bound and place-creating social relations for older individuals. Our results show that these relationships can be conceptualized as forming non-linear multi-directional, locally-contingent mobility ‘systems’. Two such systems were identified: the first centred on the communal area within the retirement community and the second focused on the senior centre. The types of non-movement, movement and communicative travel that form each of these mobility chains, the number and variety of spaces connected and consequently the form and nature of the social relations created exhibit both similarities and differences. The mobility systems created by residents of the retirement community connect and flow through more spaces, involve a greater variety of movement and non-movement and are more varied than the senior centre users’ mobility chains. For both populations the place-bound and place-creating social relations that result from and generate movement, non-movement and communicative travel occur as individuals carry out daily errands and routines. For the users of the senior centre, interaction/participation by definition is the result of routine and repeated planned presence at the senior centre. Once at the centre, contact and participation predominately result from engaging in pre-arranged organised activities. For retirement community residents interaction occurs as a result of within-community movement, extensive travel outside the community and periods spent at home alone.