sustainability Article Do Bus Rapid Transit Systems Improve Accessibility to Job Opportunities for the Poor? The Case of Lima, Peru Daniel Oviedo 1,*, Lynn Scholl 2,*, Marco Innao 3 and Lauramaria Pedraza 2 1 Lecturer Development Planning Unit, University College London, London WC1H 9EZ, UK 2 Inter-American Development Bank, Washington, DC 20577, USA;
[email protected] 3 Louis Berger, 96 Morton St, New York, NY 10014, USA;
[email protected] * Correspondence:
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[email protected] (L.S.); Tel.: +44-7428-236791 (D.O.); +1-202-623-2224 (L.S.) Received: 12 March 2019; Accepted: 10 May 2019; Published: 16 May 2019 Abstract: Investments in public transit infrastructure in Latin America and the Caribbean often aim to reduce spatial and social inequalities by improving accessibility to jobs and other opportunities for vulnerable populations. One of the central goals of Lima’s Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) project was to connect low-income populations living in the peripheries to jobs in the city center, a policy objective that has not yet been evaluated. Building on secondary datasets of employment, household socio-demographics and origin–destination surveys before and after the BRT began operations, this paper examines the contribution of Lima’s BRT system to accessibility to employment in the city, particularly for low-income public transit users. We estimated the effects on potential accessibility to employment, comparing impacts on lower versus higher income populations, and assessed the changes in location-based accessibility to employment before (2004) and after implementation (2012) for treatment and comparison groups.