Assessing transit-oriented development potential in Egypt’s emerging LRT corridor: a node–place assessment within a 3Vs- and SDG-aligned framework

Integrating transportation and land-use planning is essential for promoting sustainable urban development, particularly in rapidly expanding metropolitan regions. Transit-Oriented Development (TOD) provides a planning approach for concentrating compact, mixed-use, and pedestrian-oriented development around public transport stations. However, TOD strategies cannot be applied uniformly across a transit corridor because station areas differ in their network roles, built environments, development stages, and market conditions. This study proposes a 3Vs- and Sustainable Development Goal (SDG)-aligned framework for assessing station-level TOD potential and applies its currently measurable dimensions to Egypt’s emerging Light Rail Transit corridor connecting El Salam, the New Administrative Capital, and 10th of Ramadan City. The empirical application evaluates selected stations through Node and Place indicators using transit-network information, ridership data, land-use analysis, street-network assessment, and GIS-based spatial analysis. Market Value is retained within the conceptual framework but is not quantitatively assessed because several station areas remain under development and lack stable and comparable population, employment, and real-estate-market data. The results reveal substantial differences among the selected stations. Adly Mansour demonstrates the strongest combination of transport connectivity and local accessibility, while stations in emerging urban areas exhibit more moderate Node and Place conditions that require gradual and context-sensitive interventions. The study provides preliminary development directions for station areas and demonstrates how a staged Node–Place assessment can support TOD planning while remaining aligned with broader sustainability and SDG priorities. Future longitudinal assessment is required to incorporate Market Value as the surrounding urban areas mature. A concise robustness check further showed that the relative ordering of the four stations with complete indicator coverage remained unchanged under alternative normalization procedures and moderate weighting perturbations.