It’s the little things that count: A case study of an age and dementia friendly streetscape.
Presenter: Guy Luscombe, Principal, System Architects
Oral Presentation
With over 90% of older people opting to live at home as they age and some70% of people with dementia staying in their home environments, the case for a universally designed neighbourhood becomes even more important. Moonee Valley City Council, realising that the particularly large number of older people ageing in place in its area, developed a ‘toolkit’ to assist them to implement more age and dementia friendly public spaces.
“Age’n’dem” as it became known, used existing evidence and a user reference group to develop ‘tools’ – practical advice, guidelines and techniques – to guide those given the task of planning, designing, building and maintaining these spaces. But did it work?
Using a case study of Union Road, Ascot Vale, and referencing the toolkit, this presentation will show what was done, how it was received by users and what was learnt from it. An ongoing project, and almost invisible, it was a case of the little things that really made a big difference, and shows that, with a bit of thought and design, it is relatively easy to make local neighbourhoods more inclusive, user friendly and robust enough to meet the future demands of our increasingly urban environments.