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Canada: How to Make Cities more Inclusive and Safe for Women (Part II)

November 19, 2016 By Correspondent

A talk with Kathryn Travers from Women in Cities International about the principles of design that shape our perception of the places we live in.

Alexandra Jurecko, Montreal, Canada, SSH Blog Correspondent

The WICI team
The WICI team

The first part of my interview with Kathryn Travers from Women in Cities International (WICI) revolved around everyday street harassment in Montreal and other urban centers and the culture that enables it. This second part sets out to explore how design influences the ways in which we perceive our surroundings and how urban development could make our cities more inclusive and safe for everyone.

Design can be a powerful factor in shaping our perception of public space. Just in thinking about my own neighbourhood in Montreal, I immediately know which places feel open and comfortable, and which routes I like to avoid at night. “There are important gender gaps that should be addressed in cities”, says Kathryn.

When it comes to implementing design principles to create safer public spaces for women, “Montreal is actually kind of a pioneering city,” Kathryn points out. Six of the seven principles of design employed by WICI to conduct women’s safety audits across the world have originated from the Femmes et Ville program conducted by the City of Montreal in the 1990s.

These principles were developed by the City of Montreal to create a standard for gender-inclusive urban planning. “One of the first applications of these principles of design were the Montreal metro station exits”, explains Kathryn. “Before, you would walk up from the metro and be in this closed brick box. You never knew what was on the other side.” By implementing the first principle of design, “See and be seen”, the city redesigned the exits to be more open, with window fronts for better visibility.

The principles furthermore include instructions on how to ensure the ability to “Hear and be heard”, to “Get away and get help”, to “Know where you are and where you are going”, to “Live in a clean and welcoming environment”, and lastly, to “Work together” through community participation and social activities. Their work on the Creating safer Communities for Marginalized Women and Everyone project (2007-2011) inspired WICI to add a seventh principle of design, the principle of “Accessibility and Inclusion”.

WICI’s approach is based on cooperation with local groups: “These groups already have an established relationship of trust with local women.” In doing so, WICI gives local groups the tools to document their experiences while allowing them to develop their own ideas and recommendations for change. “We never come with solutions. We don’t have solutions,” Kathryn stresses.

By reaching out to those who are most excluded within their own communities, WICI strives to make cities more inclusive for everyone. “If we can be more inclusive now as we are working to address these gender gaps”, Kathryn explains, “then our cities will be able to better respond to the diverse needs of women and men who live there. This is how we build more inclusive cities.”

One such project brought WICI together with women from the association of Action de femmes handicapées in Montreal. In their work together they focused on the relocation of a paratransit stop at a Montreal university. “The paratransit stop was in the loading dock in the back of the university. These women who are wheelchair-dependent had to wait in the loading zone after classes at night; it made no sense,” remembers Kathryn. Once a local group has identified a problem, WICI supports their cause by establishing channels of communications to municipal or state-level governments. “We lobbied to move the stop across the street where there was already a bus stop and a space to wait with proper lighting. It took a lot of time but we eventually got it. It was a really significant achievement.”

In focusing on gender equality and women’s participation in urban development, WICI highlights how design influences the ways in which we move through public space. Design can force us to experience exclusion, or make us feel unsafe. Or, in adhering to basic principles of design, urban planning can become a powerful tool in making our cities safer and more accessible for everyone.

Alexandra is a freelance writer and recent graduate of Heidelberg University in Germany, where she earned a BA in South Asian Studies and English Literature. Having moved across the pond to live and work in Montreal, she now focuses on refreshing her French skills while volunteering her time to various community-outreach programs. You can follow her on twitter @alexjurecko.

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Filed Under: Activist Interviews, correspondents, street harassment Tagged With: canada, safe city, safety audit, women in cities international

Video: Let’s Talk about Street Harassment (Montreal)

April 26, 2016 By HKearl

What is street harassment like in Montreal, Canada? Women in Cities International, in collaboration with Lucie Pagès and Noémie Bourbonnais, took to the streets to find out over International Anti-Street Harassment Week. Here is the video highlighting what they found out, in both French & English!

Parlons du harcèlement de rue//Let’s Talk About Street Harassment from Women in Cities International on Vimeo.

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Filed Under: anti-street harassment week, Resources, street harassment Tagged With: montreal, video, women in cities international

2012 #EndSH Successes Part 1: Campaigns & Protests

December 28, 2012 By HKearl

At the end of every year, I like to look back, document and reflect on everything that has transpired in the global movement to end street harassment and assault. Yesterday I wrote about 10 of Stop Street Harassment’s achievements. Today, I’m posting a five-part series about the highlights of ALL activism that happened this year (PDF format). WHAT A YEAR!

Post 1 (this one): New anti-street harassment campaigns, new initiatives within existing campaigns, and protests.

Post 2: Creative anti-street harassment initiatives.

Post 3: Government initiatives/collaborations

Post 4: New studies, reports, and significant news articles.

Post 5 : Stories from 25 people who stood up to street harassers this year.

Girls from A Long Walk Home in Chicago organized a march around their high school.

1. Global: In March, Stop Street Harassment organized more than 100 groups in more than 20 countries (on five continents) and tens of thousands of people to collectively speak out against street harassment during Meet Us on the Street: International Anti-Street Harassment Week. This is what happened, including rallies, marches, sidewalk chalk messaging, workshops, film screenings, viral videos, safety audits, report releases, street theater, passing out fliers, art exhibits, and more.

2. Global: Hollaback! now has chapters in 60 cities worldwide, and this year they launched an “I’ve Got Your Back” Bystander Campaign in partnership with Green Dot to show bystanders who to intervene, educate them about their options, and allow them to document their successes online. Green dots on the Hollaback! maps show intervention stories. (Read their State of the Streets 2012 report for more information.)

3. Australia: People Against Street Harassment launched in December. Their mission is “confronting street harassment in Sydney via stickering, leafleting, social media and other such sweet guerilla action.”

4. Australia: Cat Calls: Called Out is another new Sydney-based anti-street harassment campaign that works to bring attention to the issue and spread ideas for stopping it.

5. Belgium: In the fall, ELLE launched a Touche Pas à Ma Pote! (Don’t Touch my Girl friend) campaign with the support of local government agencies in Brussels and it includes signs plastered on trams for the next six months.

6. Canada: Women in Cities International is part-way through a multi-year project to conduct a Blueprint project on the theme of “preventing violence against women and girls and improving their security in Canadian cities.” This year, they worked with adolescent girls in the greater Montréal area and held workshops, focus group discussions and training sessions with them. Participants also conducted women’s safety audit walks and they had the opportunity to creatively illustrate their findings and recommendations.

7. Egypt: HarassMap collects street harassment stories on its online map. During 2012, they organized more than 500 HarassMap volunteers who went outside once per month to talk to shop owners, police, doormen and others with a presence in the street about street harassment and to let them know they need to not harass and to stand up if they see harassment happening.

8. Egypt: On June 13, activists in Egypt led a day of online action to speak out against street harassment and sexual violence using the hashtag #EndSH.

9. Egypt: After several mass sexual assaults of women at Tahrir Square and after a woman was murdered by a street harasser, there were numerous protests in the summer and fall (and one protest ended because men swarmed, attacking the protesters).

Photo by Yumna Al-Arashi.

10. Egypt: There were many campaigns against street harassment in Egypt ahead of the Eid holidays. In August, volunteers organized by the Imprint Movement patrolled the streets and subway stations, watching out for harassers and helped police arrest several. In October there was a “Catch a Harasser” initiative, men spray painting harassers, and special harassment reporting hotlines.

11. Egypt: Because there are so many instances of sexual harassment and sexual assault during political protests in Tahrir Square, during political protests in November and December, people volunteered their time to serve as patrollers, working to make the area safe for women. One of the groups is called Tahrir Bodyguard.

12. India: College students in Mumbai organized a Chal Hatt Tharki campaign asking women to raise their voices against sexual harassment and street harassment.

13. India: In April, thousands of women in Kannur, a district in Kerala, gathered in the city center to ask for the right to travel safely at night and in October in Chandigarh, college students and staff of Government College Sec 42 took to streets to protest street harassment and sexual violence.

14. India: In December, the Patiala-based organization Punjab Today Foundation launched a major awareness movement against what it called the “collective guilt of society” against girls and women called SMASH (Society’s Movement Against Street Harassment).

15. India: The organization Breakthrough launched a bystander campaign for the holiday Diwali in November, because everyone deserves a safe Diwali.

16. India: In July, Blank Noise curated a series of stories about people’s first recollection of experiencing street harassment called Recall. In December, they launched the #SafeCityPledge campaign.

Image from I Stand for Safe Delhi

17. India: After a 23-year-old college woman was brutally gang rape and nearly murdered by six men on a bus (and her male friend was also beaten up by them) in mid-December, tens of thousands of people in Delhi have protested and marched daily, calling for an end to street harassment, rape, and all forms of sexual violence. For a time, they clashed with police who forbad people from gathering in groups larger than five people.

18. Jordan: In July, youth in Jordan formed a human chain from Al Hussein Sports City to the Interior Ministry Circle to protest various gender-based crimes, including street harassment, the practice of forcing rape survivors to marry their rapist, and honor killings.

19. Lebanon: Hundreds of people rallied in Beirut, Lebanon, in January to protest rape and sexual harassment and the weak laws against such crimes. The rally was organized by Nasawiya, a feminist collective that also runs The Adventures of Salwa campaign against street and sexual harassment.

20. Myanmar: In February, a new anti-harassment campaign launched called “whistle for help.” As part of the campaign 150 volunteers distributed whistles and pamphlets to women at eight busy bus stops in Yangon each Tuesday morning that month and they’ve continued to do so for nine months. The pamphlets tell women to blow the whistle when they experience sexual harassment on the bus and advises them to help other women when they blow the whistle.

21. Malawi: Women’s groups organized a protest in January, demanding the right to wear pants and mini-skirts and to demanding an end to sexual violence. Their actions were prompted by a series of attacks from gangs of men who targeted women wearing pants and short skirts.

22. Nepal: In April, 500 youth participated in a Walk for Respect against street harassment/sexual harassment in Kathmandu.

23. Nepal: After a 2011 ActionAid Report showed that street harassment is a big problem in Nepal, numerous groups came together to launch the Safe City Nepal campaign. It includes a public transportation component. Already, they have conducted a safety audit (evidence collection), held forums, and are now working on policy advocacy initiatives.

24. Peru: In February, university faculty and students launched the anti-street harassment initiative el Observatorio Virtual contra el Acoso Sexual Callejero. They have 20 volunteers who conduct interview and research on the topic, share information on their website and social media, meet with government officials, engage in awareness campaigns, and speak out against groups/people who dismiss street harassment (e.g. in September a radio show talked about street harassment as compliments and they protested it, issued a statement, etc).

25. Russia: This year the feminist group RosNahal tackled street harassment. They made a video about it (it has over two million views) and engaged in lobbying and activism that has led the Russian government to take notice.

26. Sri Lanka: Sri Lanka Unites organized the “S.H.O.W You Care” project. After receiving training, hundreds of young men boarded more than 1000 buses across a week and, according to a previously formulated strategic plan, apologized to women in the buses for any harassment they encountered in the past and provided them with information on legal recourse available to them. They also told men to take responsibility and not harass.

27. South Africa: After two teenagers wearing miniskirts were harassed and groped by a group of 50-60 men at a taxi rank, around 3,000 South Africans marched through Johannesburg in protest. The ruling African National Congress Women’s League organized the march to emphasize “that women had the right wear whatever they wanted without fear of victimization.”

28. South Africa: A new campaign against street harassment in Cape Town launched this year.

29. UK: Laura Bates launched the Everyday Sexism Project in the spring, in part because of her own street harassment experiences and other ways she faces daily sexism. In September she wrote, “The project is an ever-increasing collection of thousands of stories of sexism experienced by women around the world. In just over 5 months, the project has received nearly 6500 entries, with the last 5000 flooding in in just the last month as the momentum has gathered and word has spread.”

30. USA: Halloween in Isla Vista, the college town where University of California Santa Barbara is located, is a huge party every year. Unfortunately, some people use this as an excuse to street harass and assault people. In October, two student groups teamed up to organize a campaign against street harassment.

31. USA: Members of Penn State’s TRIOTA, the Women’s Studies Honor’s Society, held an anti-street harassment demonstration on a busy Friday afternoon in downtown State College in October. They held signs proclaiming their anti-harassment message, and even included specific remarks that had been yelled at them during their time at PSU.

32. USA: In March, Sarah Harper launched the Little Bird project to raise awareness about street harassment through the arts in San Francisco, California.

33. USA: Since January 1, 2012, at least 63 transgender individuals have been hatefully murdered, often by strangers in the streets, and many of the recent murders have been in Washington, DC. In September the DC Office of Human Rights launched a groundbreaking Transgender and Gender Identity Respect Campaign to improve the treatment of transgender and gender non-conforming people.

34. Yemen: This year, the Safe Streets campaign has encouraged women to report their stories to their website and highlighted the issue through social media and articles like this one, published on Open Democracy.

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Filed Under: anti-street harassment week, hollaback, News stories, street harassment, year end Tagged With: adventures of salwa, Blank Noise, catcalls, everyday sexism project, HarassMap, hollaback, i stand for safe delhi, rosnahal, safe streets yemen, Sri Lanka Unites, walk for respect, women in cities international

Safety Audit Walk in Montreal for Anti-Street Harassment Week

March 29, 2012 By Contributor

(Editor’s Note: This is cross-posted with permission from the blog of Women in Cities International, based in Montreal, Canada.)

From March 18th to 24th, 2012, we celebrated the second edition of International Anti-Street Harassment week….As one of the (many!) co-sponsors of this great event, Women in Cities International partnered with radio station CKUT and the 2110 Gender Advocacy Center, two Montreal-based organizations also working on special programming for Women and Girls, to organize an introductory Women’s Safety Audit walk (WSA).

For our purpose, this WSA was meant to introduce participants to its methodology, while sensitizing them to women’s security and inclusion (or lack thereof) in public space. We did this by analyzing various factors of our urban environment and how they affect how each of us participates in city life. Such factors may include built infrastructure (lighting, sidewalk width, etc.) as well as user characteristics or behaviors, including women to men ratio and…. street harassment!

A group of seven women took part in the WSA, around the downtown Concordia Campus area in Montreal, starting from the 2110 Gender Advocacy Center McKay office, walked along to Bishop street via an alley way, down to de Maisonneuve and back. Participants were asked to pay attention to lighting, maintenance, accessibility of sidewalks and buildings, the absence of greenery or parks, or just opportunities to linger. Perfectly in tone with the theme of out activity, a group of male students drinking on the Reggies pub terrace, overlooking the alley we were auditing, tried to get our attention in a not so subtle way… A group of women walking through an alley appears to be cause for attention.

It also happens that downtown Montreal is currently the stage for daily manifestations by disgruntled students calling on the government to cancel the planned hikes of education fees. On March 20th, students had blocked off part of de Maisonneuve with couches, were playing music, showcasing their message through banners and slogans. This new, albeit temporary use of the street, drew attention to how the re-appropriation of public space by citizens can be a powerful tool not only as a pressure tactic (as it was here), but as a way to make it safer and more inclusive, on the condition that the measures used attract a greater diversity of users.

As we ended our WSA, participants asked us if we could organize another such walk on a Saturday on Crescent street at 3:00 am, when folks leave the bars and clubs and the famed Montreal street can become a very uncomfortable place for many women. Reminding us once more how street harassment is a big problem, in every city, no matter how safe, and that we need to keep calling it out and denouncing it as unacceptable.

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Filed Under: anti-street harassment week Tagged With: montreal, women in cities international, women's safety audit walk

Call for Artists: Women and Mobility in the City Exhibition

July 27, 2010 By HKearl

Artists:

How do women experience cities? How does harassment impact their mobility? JAGORI and Women in Cities International want to see your artistic depiction of these questions for their transportraits exhibition.

They’re calling for photographs (even those taken by cell phone), posters, cartoons, paintings, slogans, collages, and illustrations. Full details for the contest are found on the JAGORI website. Entries are due by October 1, 2010.

Their exhibition will be displayed at the Third International Conference on Women’s Safety: Building Inclusive Cities which is taking place in Delhi, India, Nov. 22-24, 2010. (Incidentally, I just bought my plane ticket today so I’m definitely attending!) Following the conference, the exhibition will travel to different schools and cities around India.

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Filed Under: Events, Resources Tagged With: eve teasing, inclusive cities, international conference on women's safety, Jagori, sexual harassment, street harassment, transportraits, women in cities international

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