Funding source: U.S. Department of Transportation

Contract number: 69A3551747109

Funding amount: $90,030

Performance period: 1/1/2022 to 12/31/2022

This research project will study the implications and policy/practice/planning possibilities of the emerging framework of mobility justice. Mobility justice risks being conflated with transportation equity, but has important differences. This research project will elucidate those differences and explore how practioners and researchers are using mobility justice to address historic and ongoing injustices, speficially tied to race and class. The study will review uses of mobility justice within transportation organizations, interview practitioners who use a mobility justice framework, and engage them actively in the research process. The majority of those influencing the growth of a mobility justice framework identify as Black, Indigenous, or as people of color, and academic literature on mobility justice centers the experience of those historically marginalized. As usage increases, it is increasingly important to understand the racialized roots of this framework and avoid appropriation or "watering-down" of its meaning. This project will (1) investigate the origins of mobility justice in both practitioner usage and academic literature, (2) collaborate with practitioners and researchers to generate a consensus on the definition, implications, and positive examples of mobility justice, and (3) produce videos and a final report that offers clear guidance on how to use a mobility justice framework.