The Average and Heterogeneous Effects of Transportation Investments: Evidence from Sub-Saharan Africa 1960–2010

Abstract Previous work on transportation investments has focused average impacts in high- and middle-income countries. We estimate heterogeneous effects a poor continent, Africa, using roads cities data spanning 50 years 39 Using changes market access due to distant road construction as source of exogenous variation, we 30-year elasticity city population with respect about 0.08–0.13. Our results suggest that this is stronger for small remote cities, weaker politically favored agriculturally suitable areas. Access foreign besides international ports matters little. Additional evidence points suggestively rural-to-urban migration the primary increase, though cannot fully rule out natural increase or reallocation across cities.