Treating older people who order rides on Uber is merely a matter of design. Ridesharing Forum stumbled across this feature on Forbes.
In summary, Uber’s policies on aged individuals are not yet perfect.
“Aging isn’t merely a health problem or a pension problem,” said Forbes correspondent Avivah Wittenberg-Cox. “We’ve spent decades treating ageing as a problem — primarily a health problem, a pension problem, or a dependency problem. What we’ve missed is that it is also, fundamentally, a design problem.”
See? It’s a matter of design.
Forbes chatted with Briana Gilmore, the Head of Global Accessibility Policy of Uber, revealing why dealing with older passengers is a design issue, predicting what happens when companies take that seriously.
Gilmore holds a background in disability advocacy, so she is the ideal resource for this. She also is knowledgeable of global health policy and urban demography.
She then offers a simple, yet transformative reframing, that aging is fundamentally an issue of access. Once that’s seen through, “the conversation shifts from decline to design.”
In other words, what are the changes that Uber implements in order to treat carrying average-aged passengers from older ones?
“Most narratives about ageing still revolve around loss. Even the more optimistic ones tend to frame longer lives as something to be managed rather than rethought,” Forbes continued.
Gilmore also points to the concept of self-efficacy, or the belief that people “can navigate the world and that it will respond in ways we can rely on.”
She added that in mid-life, that mantra is hugely invisible because systems work, preferences feel abundant, and movement is relatively frictionless.
As the famous song “When You’re Good to Mama” in the musical film “Chicago” would say, I love 'em all, and all of them love me… Because the system works… The system called reciprocity….”
“As people age, friction begins to accumulate. Technology becomes less intuitive, transport less predictable, energy less constant, and social assumptions more limiting. Independence doesn’t disappear overnight — it gets gradually eroded through small but compounding barriers,” Wittenberg-Cox went on.
According to Gilmore, self-efficacy refers to self-belief.
She explained, “How do I know that the world is going to behave the way I believe it should when I walk out my door? As we age, systems that we used to interact with easily suddenly feel less reliable. And without self-belief, we can lose independence — because we start embodying what might be a structural loss of access. If we don’t believe the world will allow for our freedom, we stop wanting to leave our front door.”
So, what are Uber’s policies for senior passengers?
Uber right now is, as if, saying, “All about the design, right?”
And, they’re fast to respond, since senior passengers get distinct accounts, different from the rest.
“Caring for loved ones is a balancing act – that’s why we’ve made it easier to support your parents or grandparents,” Uber stated on their official website. “Set them up with a simpler ride experience so they feel confident going anywhere, knowing you’re there to help if needed.”
For more ridesharing news, keep it locked right here on Ridesharing Forum!