Planning for Aging

"But our time of standing pat, of protecting narrow interests and putting off unpleasant decisions -- that time has surely passed." ~ Barack Obama

The Philadelphia Enquirer reports on the overlooked trend:

Between now and 2030, the number of Americans 65 years and older will double to more than 70 million, according to Delaware Valley Regional Planning Commission statistics.

"It's going to be scary when we have the state of Florida in all 50 states," said Jack Carman of Medford, owner of Design for Generations, which creates therapeutic gardens and landscapes for senior communities and health-care facilities.

Carman, a landscape architect, and his wife, Nancy, a gerontologist, are authors of the recently published Re-creating Neighborhoods for Successful Aging. Their collaborators are Pauline S. Abbott, director of the Institute of Gerontology at California State University, Fullerton, and Bob Scarfo, a landscape architect and social geographer at the University of Washington-Spokane.

"Our neighborhoods were created for people in their 20s and 30s," said Jack Carman. "They're for people who can fully function."