Last June in Green Lake, Wis., Angela Zodrow received every parent’s worst call: her 12-year-old son, Emmet, had been struck by a car while riding his bike on a library sidewalk. A silver minivan had jumped the curb, crashed through a metal fence and stopped in a grassy lot. The driver, 85-year-old Jean Woolley, told police she had confused the brake and accelerator and panicked as the van accelerated. Emmet died. Woolley was not criminally charged but received citations and fines.
The Zodrows, grieving, are pressing for tougher relicensing rules in Wisconsin, where older drivers can go up to eight years between renewals. Angela Zodrow argues the current system relies too heavily on self-reporting: ‘If you say you’re fine, we believe you’re fine.’ She and her husband want more frequent testing and clearer accountability when older drivers are involved in crashes.
Across the United States, states set their own rules for driver renewal and re‑testing; there is no national standard. Policies vary widely. Many older adults depend on driving to maintain independence, especially in rural areas with limited public transit, and advocates warn against blanket age-based restrictions that would force people to stop driving solely because of their birthday.
Experts say the challenge is balancing safety and mobility. Anne Dickerson, an occupational therapy professor who directs the Research for Older Adult Driver Initiative at East Carolina University, cautions against broad age cutoffs. People are living longer, healthier lives, and crash rates for older drivers have fallen over the past quarter century. Dickerson suggests that for drivers without dementia or other serious medical issues, more intensive testing might reasonably begin around 80 rather than 70, noting many people in their 70s already self-restrict driving and are not the highest-risk group.
Data show older drivers’ crash rates have declined even as more older people hold licenses and drive more miles. Aimee Cox, a research scientist at the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, credits vehicle safety improvements and healthier aging for reducing fatalities. Still, crash risk is age-dependent: teens are the riskiest group, followed by drivers in their 20s; drivers roughly between 30 and 79 tend to be safer, while rates rise again for those 80 and older.
Deciding when an individual should stop or limit driving is rarely straightforward. Declines in ability are often gradual and subjective. Eldercare consultant David Condon says driving reductions are usually not binary — many older drivers can modify habits, avoiding night driving, bad weather or busy highways instead of stopping altogether. Ideally, clinicians would guide patients on driving, but doctors often lack time or feel reluctant to intervene. Police and family members can be hesitant to confront older drivers as well.
In the early 2000s, some states tightened relicensing rules, adding mandatory vision tests, more frequent in-person renewals and easier reporting mechanisms for relatives, police and physicians. Yet not all states adopted those measures, and some recently have rolled back requirements. Illinois, once among the strictest, passed the Road Safety and Fairness Act raising the age for a mandatory behind-the-wheel test from the 70s to 87; supporters including AARP Illinois and Republican state Rep. Jeff Keicher say driving privileges should depend on ability, not age, and that previous rules amounted to age-based discrimination.
Not every researcher agrees that loosening rules is harmless. Cara Hamann, an epidemiologist at the University of Iowa who studied road safety, analyzed two decades of crash data from more than 19 million drivers across 13 states, seven of which loosened relicensing policies. Her work found increases in crash and injury rates among drivers ages 65 to 74 in states that eased requirements. Hamann warns that U.S. relicensing often lacks ongoing assessments compared with some other countries, where drivers face more regular re-evaluations beyond occasional vision checks.
Those findings underscore the trade-offs policymakers face: stricter licensing procedures may enhance safety but can reduce mobility and independence for older adults, particularly in areas without alternatives to driving. For families like the Zodrows, the human toll of limited screening is unbearable. ‘Yes, maybe it is a little difficult or inconvenient. I’m sorry about your inconvenience,’ Angela Zodrow told lawmakers. ‘It’s harder to live without my son.’
Debate continues over the best path forward. Ideas under discussion include targeted assessments triggered by medical conditions or observed decline, improved reporting systems, more frequent vision and cognitive screenings, and community planning that reduces the need to drive. There is no single solution; policymakers, researchers and clinicians are trying to balance fairness, independence and public safety as the population ages.