How do NDC and UN’s sustainable development goals introduce new meaning of sustainability within mega transport project appraisals?

Abstract In the cities of two million or more population in India, with expected high rates of urbanisation, fifty urban metro-rail projects are planned to meet the large latent demand for mobility. The debates about mass transit projects in India have compared the appropriateness of rail-based versus bus-based city-wide public transport systems. The national government formulated Metro Rail Policy in 2017 with partial national government funding. It is important to assess such mega-transport projects in order to understand their contribution to Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) in the context of the Paris Agreement of 2015, and Agenda 2030 of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). In this paper we propose an expansion of a published project appraisal checklist on three rationales, i.e., the potential for realistic climate change mitigation, five relevant SDGs at the target level, and effective input from multiple stakeholders and actors across multiple stages of the life cycle of a project.