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Abstract
Mobility is a vital aspect of daily life that influences social inclusion, access to opportunities, and overall well-being, however, opportunities for adolescents to move independently are not equally experienced. Building on a multidimensional mobility justice framework encompassing distributive, procedural, recognitional, and restorative justice, the research aims to evaluate active mobility (walking and cycling) opportunities for adolescents (aged 12-18), a group often overlooked in policy and planning and to explore how their independent mobility can be fostered in urban environments. To achieve these objectives, the study employs a mixed-methods approach integrating qualitative and quantitative analyses in Turin (Italy). A narrative literature review identifies adolescents’ mobility needs and key factors influencing their independent mobility including individual and socio-demographic factors, environmental determinants, and mobility preferences. In parallel, GIS-based spatial analysis examines socio-demographic characteristics, mobility networks, and built-environment conditions and supports the selection of Barriera di Milano and Crocetta as contrasting socio-spatial contexts. A questionnaire is administered across two secondary and two high schools (n=444). Survey findings are subsequently explored in greater depth through in-person focus groups (27 students) and digital mobility diaries (388 diary records) to capture daily lived mobility experience of adolescents. These methods are complemented by semi-structured interviews with key stakeholders to examine how adolescents’ needs and perspectives are considered in mobility planning. The preliminary analysis highlights differences in mobility conditions and provides initial insights into adolescents’ independent mobility experiences while further analysis will compare these patterns across the selected neighbourhoods and integrate findings to examine how spatial and contextual conditions relate to adolescents’ everyday mobility opportunities and experiences. Ultimately, the research aims to identify strategies for more inclusive mobility planning and contribute to the development of a practical framework for integrating adolescents’ perspectives into future mobility planning, strengthening their recognition as active participants in planning processes and supporting their right to move independently and safely through the city.
Keywords: Active mobility, Adolescents, Independent mobility, Mobility justice, Teen-participatory planning
Introduction
Children and adolescents are essential to the future of urban environments, yet they remain often underrepresented in the decision-making processes that shape the cities in which they live and grow. A greater attention of their needs and perspectives in urban design and governance is required to secure their right to the city by ensuring safe, accessible, and equitable urban spaces where they are recognised as active participants.
Urban mobility plays a critical role in this challenge, as the capability to move independently shapes adolescents’ daily access to opportunities. Independent mobility refers to having freedom to travel alone or with peers without adult supervision (Badland et al. 2015; Shaw et al. 2013) is particularly significant during adolescence, a key stage in development of mobility habits and increasing autonomy. Independent mobility enables active transportation and outdoor activities, physical activity, social interaction, and cognitive development (Herrington and Brussoni 2015; Schoeppe et al. 2013).
Across Europe, Sustainable Urban Mobility Plans (SUMPs) are employed as spatial tools to promote more sustainable and inclusive transport. Within these frameworks, active mobility (walking and cycling) is increasingly recognised as central to sustainable mobility transitions. Despite the environmental and health benefits of active mobility, access to walking and cycling opportunities may not be equally available to all (Gössling, 2016). Inequities in infrastructure provision, safety, and policy priorities create uneven opportunities, especially in peripheral or disadvantaged areas (Pereira et al., 2017).
Despite growing attention to sustainable mobility, adolescents are rarely addressed as a distinct user group. Their mobility needs particularly regarding autonomy, accessibility, and safety are often subsumed under broader categories of “children” or “young people,” limiting their recognition as legitimate urban actors. This raises concerns about how adolescents experience inequalities in everyday mobility, whose mobility needs and experiences are recognised in mobility planning, and whether adolescents have opportunities to engage in decisions affecting their independent mobility and modal choices.
The concept of mobility justice provides a framework to address these concerns. Building on Rawlsian justice theory and Martens’ transport justice, mobility justice expands the discussion to include recognition, power relations, and historical inequalities. It highlights how infrastructures and governance structures can reproduce or challenge social and spatial inequalities. The European Environment Agency operationalises these concerns into four complementary dimensions: distributive, procedural, recognitional, and restorative justice [table_1].
Table_1. Justice in the context of sustainable transitions (adopted from EEA)
Justice dimension Description
Distributive justice Ensures fair sharing of mobility transition benefits and burdens across social groups.
Procedural justice Promotes inclusive participation and governance in decision-making, giving all communities a voice.
Recognitional justice Addresses needs and vulnerabilities of diverse and marginalized groups.
Restorative justice Aims to correct historical injustices through equitable mobility policies.
In this context, the research addresses four primary objectives; 1) To investigate adolescents’ daily active and independent mobility experiences and needs in urban contexts; 2) To evaluate the distribution and quality of infrastructures supporting accessibility and equity across contrasting socio-spatial contexts; 3) To explore how adolescents’ mobility needs and experiences are recognised or overlooked in mobility planning; 4) To identify strategies to enhance recognition of adolescents as legitimate mobility stakeholders and develop a practical framework for integrating their perspectives into mobility planning.
Methods
The research employs a mixed-methods approach combining quantitative and qualitative methods to investigate adolescents’ active mobility and autonomy needs in urban contexts through the lens of justice. The empirical analysis focuses on the city of Turin (Italy), a metropolitan area facing significant challenges of congestion, air pollution, and uneven access to sustainable mobility infrastructures. While the municipality has developed mobility strategies, including a SUMP, adolescents remain largely unrecognised as a distinct user group, making Turin a relevant case to examine justice in urban mobility.
The analysis combines spatial and socio-economic analysis with adolescents’ everyday mobility experiences. GIS-based analysis examines socio-economic characteristics, mobility networks, and built-environment conditions across contrasting urban contexts with particular attention to active mobility infrastructure and conditions around selected schools and neighbourhoods. Barriera di Milano and Crocetta are selected as contrasting contexts in terms of population density, distribution of teenagers, income level, public safety, and mobility network density.
The spatial conditions are examined alongside data collected directly from adolescents aged 12-18. A questionnaire administered across two secondary and two high schools (n=444) investigates identified determinants influencing independent mobility including parental influence, individual factors such as age and gender, perceived safety, social norms, and mobility preferences. Travel modes are examined in five travel contexts: home to school, school to home, home to activities, school to activities and free time. The survey is complemented by in-person focus groups (27 students) and 14-day digital mobility diaries including weekends providing 388 diary records. The semi-structured interviews with stakeholders are planned to examine how teenagers’ perspectives and needs are considered in mobility policies and planning processes. At the current stage, the survey analysis concentrates on descriptive patterns. These will be subsequently examined alongside the focus groups and mobility diaries to explore the adolescents’ lived daily mobility experiences across various contexts.
This mixed-methods approach supports a justice-oriented analysis by combining the spatial distribution of mobility opportunities, Adolescents’ lived experiences and needs, their participation in planning processes, stakeholders’ engagement and subsequent participatory activities will support the identification of strategies to address the inequalities identified through the research.
Results and discussion
The research approaches sustainable mobility not only as a transition towards walking and cycling but also as a question of who has capability to benefit from this transition in daily life. Preliminary spatial analysis indicates differences in mobility networks and accessibility across Turin [picture_1] and [picture_2]. Among Turin’s neighbourhoods, Barriera di Milano and Crocetta, provide contrasting socio-spatial contexts in terms of socio-demographic characteristics and mobility network density. They therefore provide the spatial context for examining how adolescents experience and navigate everyday mobility.
Picture_1. Mobility network across Turin Picture_2. School distributions across Turin
Within these contexts, initial descriptive survey results highlight that the sample is relatively balanced by gender (49.9% female, 47.6% male, 2.3% preferred not to answer). Participants are aged between 12 and 18, with 16-year-olds representing the largest group (22.7%). Moreover, through observing the reported daily travel, walking and public transport are the dominant modes across most travel contexts. For home-to-school trips, 49.7% walk and 46% use public transport while only 5.2% cycle. Under ideal conditions, however, adolescents show a strong preference for walking (44.8%) and cycling (32.7%) and lower preference for public transport (21.4%). The contrast is particularly evident for cycling which accounts for 5.2% of reported home-to-school travel but is selected by 32.7% of respondents under ideal conditions. Further analysis is needed to understand the conditions underlying this difference. This difference between current travel and preferred mobility raises the question of what conditions may enable or constrain adolescents from their preferred travel mode.
To explore these conditions, initial descriptive analysis of the survey also provides insights into adolescents’ independent mobility behaviours and needs, including individual and parental influences, perceived safety, social norms, built environment conditions and other factors related to autonomy. These preliminary patterns will be further examined alongside the mobility diaries and focus groups which provide complementary evidence on adolescents’ everyday mobility practices and lived experiences.
This perspective shifts the attention from the availability of active mobility infrastructure to adolescents’ ability to make use of it in everyday life. The presence of walking and cycling infrastructure does not necessarily mean that adolescents are able to use it independently. Their everyday mobility may also be shaped by perceived safety, parental supervision, confidence, social norms, and other individual and contextual conditions.
The following phase will therefore compare these conditions between Barriera di Milano and Crocetta alongside adolescents’ reported experiences. This allows the research to consider differences in mobility opportunities alongside recognitional questions concerning whether teenagers’ needs and experiences are acknowledged in mobility planning.
For adolescents, everyday mobility involves navigating conditions over which they often have limited control including parental restrictions, infrastructural conditions, and available modal options. These conditions can shape their ability to access daily opportunities. Simultaneously, their specific needs and experiences may remain insufficiently represented in mobility planning. The study therefore considers both differences in adolescents’ mobility opportunities and the extent in which their needs and experiences are recognised in planning. It also raises a broader question for just sustainable mobility transitions; whether increasing support for active mobility is sufficient or whether a more just transition also requires greater recognition of adolescents’ needs, experiences and voices in mobility planning.
Conclusion and future contribution
The preliminary findings of research by combining mixed-methods highlight a difference between adolescents’ current and preferred mobility modals while also indicating the importance of looking beyond infrastructure availability to the conditions shaping their ability to move independently. The expected contribution is to connect spatial differences in mobility opportunities with adolescents’ everyday experience of autonomy, safety, parental influence, and mobility preferences.
Methodologically, the study combines spatial analysis and survey data with focus groups and mobility diaries to connect urban conditions with adolescents’ daily mobility experiences. Semi-structured interviews with relevant stakeholders will further examine how their needs and perspectives are considered in mobility planning. Conceptually, the research advances the operationalisation of mobility justice by explicitly recognising teenagers as legitimate urban actors. The next stage of the research will focus on the comparative analysis of Barriera di Milano and Crocetta and the integration of the different sources of data. This will provide a basis for identifying strategies to reinforce adolescents’ recognition as legitimate mobility stakeholders and subsequently for developing a practical framework that integrates their perspectives into mobility planning.
Ultimately, the research considers whether a sustainable mobility transition can become more just by addressing not only provision of active mobility opportunities but also the conditions that shape their independent mobility and the extent of their inclusion in mobility planning.
References
References
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