Transport project assessment methodology within the framework of sustainable development

Faced with a choice of different transport projects, such as road or rail infrastructure projects, which project is the most sustainable? We suggest a relatively simple and transparent evaluation method for such projects. First, transport issues within the sustainable development framework must be addressed, bearing in mind the strong meaning of the term, which is the only concept allowing environmental issues to be taken seriously into account. It also means linking local and global aspects, long and short terms, and thus to specify the time and geographical scales of projects and their impacts. Secondly, we put forward these main principles as evaluation criteria enabling the sustainable development concept to be made operational. We suggest three economic criteria, four social criteria and eleven environmental criteria, in addition to an aggregation method for these criteria integrating the social or political preferences of decision-makers or their representatives. A concern that is often significant in transport projects is the future of traffic mobility, whose main parameters we have analysed in order to put forward probable scenarios, which form the basis for applying the criteria listed above. (C) 2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.