Sustainable Mobility Linkage with the Sustainable Development Goals: Period-Level Mapping and Thematic Analysis (2010 – 2025)

Sustainable mobility is central to the 2030 Agenda, but the extent to which research in this domain contributes to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) remains unaddressed. Addressing this gap, this paper is the first to systematically analyze the sustainable mobility literature through the explicit lens of the SDGs, offering a panoramic view of how transport-related research has aligned with global development priorities over time. We analyzed a Scopus corpus of 9,513 publications (2010–2025; articles and reviews in English) and segmented it into three periods to capture pre-SDG uptake, early operationalization, and recent consolidation. Period-level SDG mapping was conducted using the JRC SDG Mapper applied to concatenated titles, abstracts, and author keywords. To contextualize these signals, we complemented the mapping with a bibliometric overview (production, venues, actors) and thematic analyses using VOS viewer (keyword co-occurrence) and Biblioshiny (trend topics, thematic maps, thematic evolution). Findings reveal a consistent focus on SDG 11 (specially targets 11.2/11.3), a sharp rise in SDG 13, and steady progress in SDGs 7 and 9. The field has shifted from planning-focused research to implementing energy- and climate-friendly solutions, with a surge in publications from 2021–2025, spanning transport, energy, and environmental journals, and involving global researchers. However, SDGs 5, 10, 14, and 16 remain underexplored, with SDG 3 often implied rather than explicit. This study provides policymakers, funders, and researchers with an evidence-based map of where sustainable mobility research already contributes to the SDGs and where targeted incentives are needed before 2030.