Skift Take
An aging, less mobile population is a design challenge on one hand and a revenue opportunity on the other.
With the United Nations reporting that the global population of persons over 60 will increase from approximately 810 million in 2012 to close to 2 billion people by 2050, the current design of travel facilities are highly inadequate, to the point of posing a risk to growth -- especially for aviation.
This is because the prevailing design trend is to make airports larger and for aircraft tighter, neither of which address the needs of a significant portion of the future traveling public. But Boeing has just patented a self-driven seat which may make the airport terminals of tomorrow a more passenger-friendly place for those with limited mobility.
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