Towards equitable, smart, and sustainable urban mobility: Governance archetypes and their relations

• Identifies five governance archetypes in transport systems. • Proposes a framework linking archetypes to governance configurations. • Highlights the interplay of values, causal attributions, and rationales. • Offers conceptual tools to facilitate problem structuring in complex mobility contexts. This study examines expert perceptions on achieving equitable, smart, and sustainable urban mobility and transport development. Through qualitative interview analysis, we identify five archetypes with distinct core values, causal attributions, and rationales: the Institutional Architect, Behaviour & Culture Challenger, Equity Champion, Resource Optimiser, and Inclusive Mobiliser. We propose a framework to consider these archetypes relationally along the dimensions of ‘orientation’ (system | people) and ‘approach’ (incremental | transformative). We discuss the implications of our findings, highlighting their potential in diverse, pluralistic decision-making environments characteristic of mobility and transport planning. Our study contributes a framework and conceptual repertoire of archetypes to support constructive decision-making in complex contexts.