A city designed by women.

[ScrimshawTheSecond]

I thought this was really interesting.

The reasons why women need more (not less) toilet provision (some pretty down to earth biology).
Considering transport, street furniture and playgrounds with women's needs in mind. Lastly, ways to tackle sexual assault.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/world-50269778/what-would-a-city-designed-by-women-be-like

I saw that on the news. Thanks for that link.

I’ve just watched the video. It’s amazing what they’re doing in Barcelona and not one ‘what about the men’ comment. That’s true feminism and by protecting women and children, the good men are also being protected. Those super blocks are brilliant. Belfast city centre used to only permit buses, because of the troubles, but it was great because pedestrians were safer. Now it’s a free for all and there are loads more buses and cars and it is definitely not as pleasant, though the shops are much better

There's been a bit of a movement recently in architecture/design to break up spaces, I think. Have you heard of the 'pocket neighbourhoods' idea? Basically creating smaller units within a city, like the 'superblock'/suprilla idea in the film. More human-friendly all round, as you say.

Definitely the way to go - for environmental reasons as well as feminist ones. And I liked the point about spaces being designed so they can't just be taken over by the strongest influence.

Yes, this is brilliant. Vienna have been through a similar process too and have produced a huge manual of urban design which is designed to bring these issues into the mainstream (I can post a link to it in English if anyone is interested).

This is very much what Caroline Criado Perez covers in Invisible Women, and if you haven't read it, I can't recommend it too highly.

I'd be really interested to see that manual, artisan, please!

And yes CCP's book is on my tbr pile ... it's just quite a big pile.

Love this.

here you go!

I'd be really interested to see that manual, artisan, please!

Me too!

Brilliant, thank you artisan! Will read with interest and pass it on.

This is very exciting that women are becoming involved in City planning. The point made in the clip about space resonates with me. The park near where I work is given over to golf, football, rugby and cricket - mainly men's sports. There is a path around the outside and benches on the edge plus a very small children's play park, but the vast majority of the space is given over to men.

Not quite the same but there were also the Beguines in Europe, women only living that lasted for hundreds of years:

www.nytimes.com/2008/07/13/travel/13journeys.html

whc.unesco.org/en/list/855

Ooh, more fascinating stuff, Driech, thank you! There is a woman-only camp in Syria, though that's a bit of an extreme situation:

en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jinwar
anfenglishmobile.com/women/women-s-village-jinwar-to-open-on-november-25-30946

I saw the video too and liked it. In my small village there is a football club, rugby field and astroturf for football and skate park at the community centre which are almost exclusively used by men and boys.

I especially liked the night time Barcelona, it didn't seem as full of drunk men on the pull at the end of the night. As a 40 year old women picking my DD up from town I have been approached in my car by pervy men offering me a shag so making the city at night safer would be a brilliant thing. I hate my DD going into town at night and wouldn't feel safe to go myself either. I liked the anti perv messages, reporting forms and stalls too.

Edinburgh are trying some similar ideas but it’s based around carbon emissions, not protecting women. It might have a similar effect, though, inadvertently! However, about 10 years ago we shut almost all of our public toilets because they were becoming drug hangouts. No one used them as a result, so it was easy for it to be seen as a cost-cutting measure. However, the impact of fewer toilets out there was never measured - as a mum, I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve had to tell the kids to pee in the bushes, but adults can’t do that.

Notice how they point out the biological need for more and larger toilet facilities for women. This is what we need, not outright removal of women's only toilets as is currently happening in many places.