Transportation
Prototyping the Age-Ready City
At MIT’s AgeLab, researchers work on autonomous wheelchairs, neighborhood design for the cognitively impaired, and a host of other strategies to prepare for the “silver tsunami.”
It only takes a few minutes for a team of researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology to age me nearly 50 years, but the transformation, at least when it comes to getting around, is fairly complete.
After zipping me into a blue jumpsuit, they strap on bungee cords that make it impossible to move my arms above my shoulders and load me down with about 20 pounds of weights, mimicking the loss of muscle strength that comes by the time a person reaches her eighth or ninth decade. The outfit is accessorized with heavy gloves and specially-adapted Crocs to simulate arthritic hands and unsteady footing.