ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Sustain. Cities
Sec. Urban Transportation Systems and Mobility
Volume 7 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/frsc.2025.1524020
Sustainable transport strategies and their implementation barriers in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia
Provisionally accepted
- 1Ethiopian Civil Service University, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia
- 2Addis Ababa University, Addis Ababa, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia
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Emerging cities like Addis Ababa are now facing rapid urbanization and motorization, which results in an increasing urban mobility challenges. Despite the global advancements in sustainable mobility, these cities are struggling with limited public transport that largely relies on informal and lowcapacity transport modes and automobile use, causing traffic congestion, road traffic fatalities, noise pollution, and vehicle emission-related challenges. This paper aims to identify the sustainable transport strategies and key barriers to the implementation of these strategies, taking Addis Ababa as a case study. The study is based on empirical evidence from residents' and experts' perspectives, with the support of desk reviews. The analysis was done using descriptive analysis and ordinal logistic regression. The result revealed that the transport strategies in the study city emphasized promoting non-motorized and public transport, mobility management, planning considerations for land use and transport integration, adoption of technological solutions, institutional reforms, and awareness campaigns. It was found that most of the strategies are on paper without effective implementation, and the prevalence of pressing mobility challenges characterizes the city. The findings also indicated that the implementations of various ambitious sustainable transport strategies are constrained by financial shortage, and poor institutional quality with bad governance and management systems, together with weak coordination among institutions. Additionally, a lack of guiding framework for sustainable urban mobility, a lack of political commitment and leadership towards sustainable transport solutions, limited technological adoption, and socio-cultural attitude towards car use with limited alternative mobility options influenced the implementation of the stated strategies. This study suggests addressing the barriers comprehensively and the need for adopting a cost-effective strategy tailored to the study city context in Addis Ababa that helps with the transition toward sustainable mobility and livability.
Keywords: sustainable mobility, Public transport, Non-motorized transport, Mobility management, integration, technological solutions, Institutional quality, Awareness campaign
Received: 06 Nov 2024; Accepted: 17 Jun 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Tazzie, Adugna and Woldetnsae. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Yibeltal Dubale Tazzie, Ethiopian Civil Service University, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia
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