Exploring the place of social impacts in urban transport planning: the case of Casablanca City

Abstract

ABSTRACT In context of rising acknowledgement of the necessity of implementing sustainable mobility principles, urban transport is becoming a critical concern for Megacities of developing countries. As finding an equilibrium between social, environmental and economic impacts of transport investment is crucial but not necessarily straightforward, this paper focuses on how the social impacts are conceptualized and integrated in the Metropolitan Transportation Plan of Casablanca through its different elaboration stages by conducting context and content analysis. We observe that social impacts are neither meaningfully formulated into specific and clear objectives nor comprehensively included in the assessment process and they have not been object of an appropriate performance measures and indicators. We end the paper by suggesting the formulation of an appraisal framework for transport projects and policies where social impacts should be operationalized based on Social Impact Assessment framework guidelines.