Feminist cities
Business Daily
BBC
4.4 • 816 Ratings
🗓️ 31 March 2021
⏱️ 17 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Why do so many women still feel unsafe walking the streets of our cities? We take a look at the idea of a feminist city. What is it and what could it look like? And where in the world are they getting it right? Since the murder of Sarah Everard in South London in March, women all over the UK took to social media to discuss their experiences of walking the streets. And the lengths they go to stay safe. The 33 year old was walking home from a friend’s house in the evening she was murdered. The killing touched women all over the country - and even further afield. But what if women didn’t fear being out on the streets? Tamasin Ford speaks to Leslie Kern, the author of Feminist City: Claiming Space in a Man-Made World and to Sara Ortiz Escalante, a member of Col·lectiu Punt 6 (Collective Point 6), a cooperative of architects, sociologists in Barcelona in Spain who have worked in more than 120 towns and cities around the world with just one aim in mind - to put a feminist perspective on everything they do. Plus she speaks to Ellen Woodsworth, the co-chair and founder of Women Transforming Cities International in Canada, an organisation aimed at making cities better places to live for women and girls. Plus she speaks to entrepreneur Dr Kalpana Viswanath, co-founder & CEO of Safetipin, an app that uses data mapping tools to make public spaces safer for women. (Picture credit: Ruben Earth, Getty Creative)
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hello, I'm Tamasin Ford. Welcome to Business Daily from the BBC. Why is it that in 2021, many women still don't feel safe on our city streets? |
| 0:13.7 | Capitalism is very connected with patriarchy. So we have cities that have been planned mostly from a male center perspective and |
| 0:22.5 | mostly taking men as the main characters of the picture. It's not just about safety. Have you ever |
| 0:29.8 | navigated public transport systems with kids? It really reminded me that now that I was a mother, |
| 0:40.2 | I was not expected or even wanted in certain urban spaces the way that I had been before. |
| 0:42.4 | So if our cities weren't designed for women, can technology play a role in changing that? |
| 0:48.4 | The point of safety pin is to say that how do we, we as women, claim our right to the streets, our right to the city? |
| 0:56.8 | You know, we get advised to stay off the streets. |
| 0:59.6 | But if we stay off the streets, they actually become more unsafe. |
| 1:03.4 | In today's Business Daily from the BBC, we take a look at the idea of a feminist city. |
| 1:09.4 | What should and could one look like? |
| 1:17.1 | I'm about to walk through an underpass to get to my local tube stop in London. It's the |
| 1:22.9 | middle of the day. And as you can hear, I've got my kids with me but still my senses |
| 1:29.3 | are suddenly slightly heightened |
| 1:31.7 | it's not that I feel |
| 1:33.5 | fear it's just that |
| 1:35.4 | I'm acutely aware of everything |
| 1:37.6 | around me if it was dark |
| 1:39.5 | and I was on my own I'd have my keys |
| 1:41.2 | in my hands I'd get my head |
| 1:43.4 | down and I'd get through this underpass as quickly as and I'd get through this underpass as quickly as possible. |
| 1:55.7 | But what if we as women didn't fear being out on the streets? What if the city was built for us? |
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