The population of post-industrial countries is ageing. This well-documented phenomenon has resulted in an increased need for understanding travel behaviour of seniors as a significant and growing population group [1]. Researchers in industrialised countries have focused on areas such as the association between travel behaviour of seniors and their health [2], availability of travel modes and their lifestyle [3], or shopping trips for older and physically challenged people [4]. However, not all industrialised countries facing the same problems have been studied to the same extent. For example, travel behaviour of seniors related to mode choice has received no attention in the Eastern European countries such as the Czech Republic and Slovakia.
Both the Czech Republic and Slovakia have much the same age structure of the population and face similar demographic processes. The aging population is partly due to a structural change due to increasing life expectancy and decreasing fertility. The ratio of the population over 65 years in the Czech Republic is 18.4% [5] and in Slovakia 12.7% [6]. According to population predictions, by the year 2030, the proportion of the population over 65 years will be 23.9% in the Czech Republic and 21.6% in Slovakia [7, 8]. Based on that evidence, the role of seniors in urban populations is beginning to be important and will be crucial in the near future.
However, even from today’s perspective seniors represent a significant sub-population. They are such sub-population not only in terms of prospective consumers [9], but also in terms of citizens facing specific challenges such as cognitive or physical impairments. Their needs and limitations must be considered to maintain seniors’ access to activities such as social visits, shopping, or visiting a doctor [1]. In other words, to remain healthy and fulfilled, seniors need to have the capacity to satisfy their travel needs. As a result, the access to activities is associated with higher levels of psychological well-being, positive self-perception [10], or social activities [11]. On the other hand, limited access to activities reduces possibility to satisfy one’s life needs. Such an outcome is related to various issues with a policy-making relevance including the development of depression [12].
Among other factors, the access to activities depends on various aspects such as quality (or a mere existence) of public transport or the possibility to use a passenger car. The latter alternative applies in particular when there is no mode-choice alternative present or when costs of the alternative (including its attractiveness) are high [13]. As a result, in cities and rural areas with insufficient public transport service a passenger car may be the crucial element of mobility, whereas in dense urban areas it could be replaced with different mode choices [14, 15].
All in all, passenger cars remain the favourite transportation mode for people older than 64 in Western Europe [4], the United States [14], or Australia [1]. Various factors can influence this situation. Initially, the increasing distance (in both time and space) between a residence and the nearest public transport stop decreases the willingness of seniors to use public transport. Moreover, interchanges during one trip tend to discourage seniors from using public transport [16]. Another contributing factor is the accessibility of public transport reflecting physical and cognitive impairments of the seniors, which could be achieved (e.g.) through employing low-floor buses [17].
Those impairments are also related to the ownership of a driving licence, i.e. another factor influencing mode choice. Relatively frequent driving skill assessments in older age may result in losing a driving licence and driving ceasing. In addition, not being able to drive a car is more and more frequent with the increasing age of seniors. Driving cessation in return significantly influences individual’s lifestyle, especially because of its pressure to change well-established and previously functional behavioural pattern of a car driving [2]. Driving cessation (along with unavailable alternative mode choices) could be challenging since active lifestyle is mobility-demanding [3]. In the case of not being able to drive anymore, some seniors may turn to their relatives or other persons within their social network [18]. However, the social network may not have the capacity to cover all the trips. Furthermore, this issue has a gender dimension as fewer women own driving licenses in comparison to their male counterparts. The lack of transportation alternatives burdens older women more than older men [3].
Travel behaviour of seniors in Eastern European countries might be comparable to previously studied regions such as Western Europe, USA, Canada or Australia regarding the level of urbanisation. However, there are also possible cultural, societal and historical differences that question mechanical extrapolation from one context into another. Only recently, several travel behaviour surveys (TBS) have been conducted in the Czech Republic and Slovakia. In 2013 (mid-May to June), an international travel behaviour survey was carried out in border regions of the Czech Republic, Austria, and Slovakia as a part of the project ‘Transport model AT-CZ’. The main purpose of the survey was to compile and parameterize the transport model of the South Moravian Region in the Czech Republic [19]. Brno, the major city in the region, was one of the studied areas of the research (hereafter TBS Brno). Moreover, in 2014 (June, September to mid-November), a travel behaviour survey in the city of Bratislava (TBS Bratislava) was conducted as a part of Transport Master Plan of Bratislava, the capital of Slovakia. The purpose of the TBS Bratislava was to provide necessary information for purposes of multimodal transport model and transport planning measures.
In this study, we utilised the data collected in the survey to focus on the travel behaviour of senior citizens in Brno and Bratislava. Both cities have a similar area, population, the share of inhabitants over 60 years, urban structure and development history, transport system and its conditions for seniors [5, 6]. Rapid residential development is typical for Brno and Bratislava and could be characterised by the concept of microdistrict in the era of socialist cities [20]. After 1989, both cities witnessed a gradual lately upward suburbanization and reurbanisation due to structural economic and social changes in both countries. Urban structure of both cities is therefore very similarly characterised by one historical urban core surrounded by dense residential and industrial areas from the socialist era and light residential suburban areas in places (Fig. 1).
The aim of the study is to explore mode choice as an important aspect of travel behaviour of seniors in the two principal cities in Eastern Europe, the area with no previous coverage on the topic. To provide a more comparable insight, we decided to focus on the two age groups: 60–69 years old and over 70. It is because seniors who are over 70 have access to free public transport in both cities. In addition, the price of public transport is reduced for seniors over 60 in Brno, but not in Bratislava [21, 22]. We use multinomial logit model for mode choice which tests socioeconomic variables, demographic variables and travel time as the attribute of the trip, in order to explore sources of potential differences in mode choices by seniors in the studied cities. The outcome of this study is, therefore, relevant especially for policymakers since it represents the basis for an informational database. Moreover, by focusing on the under-researched region, we aim to provide useful insights which can be used by other societies [3].