Guidelines for developing inclusive transport infrastructure.

 

Accelerating infrastructure development is key to responding to global challenges, but we must ensure that we leave no one behind. The world is facing grave challenges that place the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development in jeopardy. The Sustainable Development Goals Report 2022 finds that the COVID-19 pandemic has wiped out more than four years of progress in poverty eradication, armed conflicts have caused a record 100 million people to be forcibly displaced, and climate change has induced heatwaves, droughts and floods that affect billions of people. Infrastructure development must be accelerated to respond to these challenges and address development gaps. Infrastructure is a key enabler of sustainable development, as it influences the achievement of up to 93% of the Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) targets. However, there remains a huge gap in infrastructure development worldwide. BBefore the COVID-19 pandemic, an estimated $97 trillion of global infrastructure investment was needed from 2016 to 2040 to address the SDGs, half of which was needed for transport infrastructure. While the world is slowly recovering from the pandemic, the progress towards filling this infrastructure gap has slowed. Future infrastructure must be developed through inclusive solutions and encompass more social needs. Much attention has been placed on accelerating climate action and sustainability in infrastructure without due focus on the needs of women and marginalized groups, persons living in poverty, indigenous peoples, refugees and internally displaced persons, among others. The COVID-19 pandemic and the climate crisis4 have highlighted and exacerbated existing vertical and horizontal inequalities in access to infrastructure, making it clear that we must act urgently to not only fill the global infrastructure gap, but also ensure that we mainstream inclusion alongside sustainability and resilience in infrastructure development, in order to build a sustainable future that leaves no one behind. 

These guidelines promote the development of inclusive transportinfrastructure through a participatory and integrated approach. This includes three main concepts that underpin the entire publication: leave no one behind (LNOB), meaningful participation, and an integrated approach to quality infrastructure development.

 1. Leave no one behind

 The LNOB principle is at the heart of the 2030 Agenda and promotes equality, non-discrimination and equity for all peoples, especially highlighted in SDG 5 (achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls) and SDG 10 (reduce inequality within and among countries).5 It places special emphasis on those left furthest behind and the most excluded, such as women and girls, children, youth, older persons, persons with disabilities, LGBTIQ+ people, persons living in poverty, indigenous peoples, refugees and internally displaced persons, and any other group facing social exclusion within specific contexts. Throughout the guidebook, these social groups are referred to collectively through the term 'women and marginalized groups'. These guidelines recognize that both gender equality and social inclusion are major components of LNOB and that one cannot be achieved without the other. This is reflected throughout the publication through an emphasis on Gender Equality and Social Inclusion (GESI) transformative approaches, which involve an active attempt to examine, question and change systemic barriers and harmful norms and practices, which result in intersectional experiences of transport exclusion.

 2. Meaningful participation 

Supporting the 2030 Agenda requires a whole-of-government, whole-ofsociety approach that is truly collaborative and participatory. We need to work together to achieve a cross-cutting, bottom-up and sustainable approach to inclusive transport infrastructure development. This publication encourages this firstly through collaborative authorship by international, non-governmental and private sector organizations with diverse perspectives and areas of expertise in infrastructure development. The publication also provides recommendations that focus on enabling the active participation of women and marginalized groups in transport development, beyond consultation. Finally, it promotes collaboration among various actors, such as civil society organizations (CSOs), governments and policymakers, planners, designers, project managers, contractors, procurement officials, operators, asset owners and local communities. 

3. An integrated approach to quality infrastructure development 

Given the costly nature of infrastructure investment, we need to make sure that we develop quality infrastructure, which can be thought of as the right infrastructure done well at the right time. ‘The right infrastructure’ is sustainable, resilient and inclusive within its context. Many women and marginalized groups are reliant on natural resources and are often the most vulnerable to climate change impacts. And so, sustainability and resilience considerations must be integrated into the approach to developing inclusive infrastructure. An integrated approach also recognizes that infrastructure works in a system-of-systems. This means that transport infrastructure is enabled by other infrastructure systems such as digital communications for coordinating transport routes, energy for powering vehicles and equipment, and water and sanitation for servicing transport stations, among others. These systems operate through the interaction of elements in the built, natural and enabling environments. For example, roads (built environment) are supported by land (natural environment) and are designed based on technical standards (enabling environment). This publication takes an integrated approach by providing recommendations that consider integrated solutions across the entire life cycle of infrastructure development (which includes the planning, delivery and management of infrastructure). These recommendations can be broadly categorized as solutions towards strengthening the enabling environment, prioritizing inclusive solutions, delivering inclusive solutions well, and maximizing the system performance of existing built and natural environment assets

Guidelines for developing inclusive transport infrastructure