The correspondence between urban transformation and sustainable urban mobility planning indicators in Nasr City District over five consecutive political eras (1956–2024)

Abstract

Urban Transformation has become a phenomenon in Egypt. With rapid changes within the Egyptian society, politics, and governance over the decades, skylines and images of its cities become more noticeable. This directly affected transportation infrastructure, modes, networks and urban mobility patterns, with most changes taking place in the urban areas of the Greater Cairo Region (GCR). While Egypt signed the New Urban Agenda in 2016, which aligns the process of urban development with the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), there might be stark controversies with the actual implementation on the ground concerning achieving sustainable urban mobility. The objective of this research was to investigate the relationship between traditional transportation planning interventions and the Sustainable Urban Mobility Planning (SUMP) indicators. A qualitative method was adopted, based on a longitudinal study on the macro and micro scales to assess Nasr City district’s urban transformation in terms of urban mobility and land use over five consecutive political eras (1956-2024). The physical transformation of the road cross-section and transportation modes of Mostafa AL Nahas Road, a main artery in NC district presented a deeper insight into the urban mobility planning interventions in NC. Furthermore, a matrix was designed to evaluate the correlation between the mobility interventions in NC and the sustainable Mobility indicators. The research reached the main conclusion that while mobility measures solely focused on easing the traffic flow and resolving congestion, urban transformation of the NC district has and will continuously witness the struggle between following SUMP and non-sustainable mobility interventions.