Comment: Life when you become a senior driver

A driver's licence provides independence, mobility, and an enhanced lifestyle for seniors. Photo / Jacob Ammentorp Lund

OPINION:

My new driver’s licence arrived this week. It was a couple of weeks early, but its presence and the process attached to it signalled the beginning of a new phase in driving. The last driving test I had to do was for my heavy traffic licence, almost 50 years ago.

I needed that as a delivery driver for a laundry business. That time, the test was a drive around the block in the company truck. This time, it was a medical and eye test by our doctor, and then involved fronting to the AA for the photo ID and temporary licence issue. So, now I’m at least fit to drive for the next five years, and will need to re-test every two years after that.

When you reach the age of 75, it is the first time you have to front up to other parties to attest to being fit to drive. You might not have to demonstrate driving skills at that stage, unless your doctor says so, but you at least have to think about it. You are officially a senior driver, and some people, particularly the keyboard warriors of social media, have plenty to say about seniors’ fitness to drive.

Let’s face it. We do become less agile and mobile as we age. Our joints stiffen and our muscles weaken. Our vision, particularly our peripheral vision, changes, as does our hearing. Our reaction times may be slower, and the many medications we tend to gather as we age may compromise our ability to concentrate or make us drowsy.

Chronological age, though, is just a number, and there is no way you can judge someone’s ability to drive based on that number. Drivers with over 60 years of experience have coped with a huge number of changes, and that experience helps us to foresee and react to a range of on-road situations.

Older drivers also tend to be more conservative, more discerning about weather and road conditions, and have a higher incidence of seatbelt wearing and lower rates of impaired driving. Older drivers don’t need to prove anything to their mates and are less likely to speed or do anything outrageous on the road.

By and large, older drivers are cautious, safe drivers, but for drivers aged 75 and over, the doctor holds the whip hand. They can approve, decline, limit, or refer applicants for on-road safety tests. In the last year or so, 54 per cent of those referred passed the test. That is about the same national pass rate learner drivers have when testing for their restricted licence. The thing is, though, is that young drivers get another chance - older drivers don’t. Once you fail the driving test, your licence expires and is gone.

Therein lies the issue for older drivers. The loss of your driver’s licence means a loss of independence and mobility, as well as a severely impacted lifestyle. We often see our cars as defining who we are, so we have issues of ego and self-esteem as our world becomes significantly smaller.

Driving a car represents freedom and control. It allows us to connect with others, go shopping, access healthcare, play sports, socialise, enjoy our families and go to work. We will vigorously defend these rights, but self-awareness about where our driving is at is important as well.

To assist older drivers in judging their ability, the AA Driving School offers a free “in-car” coaching session to members aged 74 and over. This is a coaching session, not a test. The results are confidential and there is nothing hanging on the outcome.

A qualified instructor provides an hour-long procedure that covers a vehicle check, cockpit drill, driving style, recognition of hazards and how generally you control the car. The session conveys safe driving tips and your visual scanning is checked with a mirror on the dashboard.

Being reassured about your safe, sensible driving may also lead to a challenging conversation about what stage you are at, and when it might be sensible to hand over the keys. Senior drivers are some of the safest drivers on our roads. Judge the driving behaviour, and not any pre-conceived notion about the age of the driver or how they look.