hello and welcome to another arc daily
interview
today we celebrate the launch of her
city a platform that involves girls in
urban development
in order to make better cities for
everyone training the tables and putting
girls in the expert position
this digital toolbox aims to create more
inclusive equal and sustainable cities
and communities
the initiative makes methods and tools
available to urban actors globally
in order to support cities and
integrating careers participation in
their long-term strategies
and to talk about it i have here with me
today part of the team behind this
digital toolbox for inclusive urban
planning
from new and habitat we have chiara
martinez the architect and urban planner
at the global public space program
and krista lahood program management
officer hi girls
hi and from the swedish independent
think tank global utman inc we have with
us
julian project manager hi topham hi
hi okay so these ladies were all
responsible for coordinating the
development of the platform
my name is kisa haru i’m an architect
and i’m a designer and a managing editor
of arc daily and i will be leading this
panel today
so how is everyone doing we’re good
i’m very excited to have you here so
let’s just
jump right into it and let’s talk about
the team so
can you start introducing yourselves and
tell us briefly about your contribution
to the project
toby tell me yeah uh
like you said my name is tobia lin and i
work at the independent think tank the
wallet running
and i was there
in the beginning before we started the
hair city toolbox with another project
called urban gas movement that then
grew and became their city toolbox and
in this
during this period i’ve been working
with messaging a lot and also taking
care of the stakeholder engagement
parts of the toolbox you could say
and the girls from the inhabitants
can you tell us about your contribution
okay
yeah maybe i’ll just jump into it so
yeah my name is kyrgyzstan i work for
unhabitat for the past
five years and i’m one of the co-needing
uh
people in diversity project i was part
of setting up
uh like i was part of of the team that
set up the project
uh the national team that met in
stockholm to define the project
its objective uh to outline the process
and which digital tools
uh was needed to be included so happy to
be here
i really hope your mic works can you
hear me now
yes we can yeah
so i’m kiara again as you said and i
also i’ve been engaged in the
hair city project since uh since the
global
collaboration with global mining has
started so after the pilot project
in sweden and i’m i also have a
background in architecture and urban
design so i’m mostly supporting
on the design components and uh how to
integrate the
participatory parts uh into actual
into the actual process interesting
so toby can you tell us a bit how did
the project start
and can tell us the backstory of it yes
absolutely
we mentioned it a bit just now that her
city is actually a result
in some way from the urban girls
movement that was launched
2017 and in 2017 we started with a
global mapping of
efficient methods and tools to
contribute to increasing quality and
inclusion in urban development and so
the ambition was really to highlight the
values of increasingly evolving women
and girls in urban development processes
and their results from that mapping was
then implemented
in the swedish municipality of buchike
and that was called the urban girls
movement
so they would test the hypothesis plan a
city for girls and it would work for
everyone
so after the butcher get pilot we wanted
to share the methodology
with everyone and we saw a need for
the digital tools and to do this sharing
so we
came together with you in habitat and
compiled the digital toolbox
that is now her city so now we’re
working on implementing it globally so
in a nutshell you can say that it’s
global knowledge tested in a swedish
context
and then share it again globally
interesting
um so i would like to ask kiara who are
the main stakeholders
and actually who can benefit from this
platform from her city
i think the idea behind her city is that
uh
we are targeting everyone that actually
wants to make a change and they want to
see a change in their cities
so we are really focusing on local
governments
but uh but we actually also really wants
to
uh empower girls and uh community
members
so uh from let’s say the higher level of
the stakeholders uh uh
up to the up to the ground let’s say
and um but also especially including
professionals and all the urban actors
that are related to urban planning and
urban design and the the block one
in in a way it’s one of the first
uh one of the first steps and aims to
select which are which are the
stakeholders that are the more
important for your context and helps to
identify
what are all the people that you should
be uh partnering with to
to make uh to make the best of it and uh
as i said like the primary group the
person the the
people that we actually focus the most
is is the girls so trying to
involve those active and young
women and girls that really wants to uh
make an impact in their community but
then also of course
uh we need the support and the expertise
of the professionals the architects the
urban planners
and in the local governments and the
public institutions that are the
facilitators of that
basically it takes a village
so kiara and christelle both of your
work um you are part of the global
public space program and we’ve been
covering your work for a while here on
arc daily
can you tell us from your experience of
working with people why is it important
to have a platform like her city
like how would you evaluate for example
the participation of women
prior to this tool yeah so
uh thanks for step so we’ve been working
for years to support local governments
to mainstream gender and have effective
participation in their cities
but what we often realize is that in
many parts of the world
women and girls are brought into the
discussion
only at certain phases of the of the
project so they’re not really part of
the overarching city discussions
they’re invited either to just like be
uh giving ideas at a certain moment
or just saying their needs at another
moment
or just be consulted in a way so in some
sort of way they’re considered as a
passive
participants rather than active
participants so
this is what where her city tour box
came
to place to make them the need make them
the expert
in this process the tables are turned uh
they become more empowered they are
actively participating in shaping their
future environment through the use of
the certain tools which proven to be
very
much needed during the pandemic as well
uh they’re not only expressing their
needs
you know at the cern at a certain
finance projects but they’re having a
discussion more at the
city scan you know also influencing
strategies at the city scan and this is
how changes can
can be seen when you start the
discussion as when not just on a finance
project but you know you up scan it to
the city and you
and you give them the opportunity to uh
you know visualize their idea to express
their how to change their environment uh
and how to put
their um you know needs into into action
so they’re becoming the urban planner
and the architect at the end of the day
through the her city toolbox and this
becomes like a mainstream thing like all
cities start integrating
all these girls like from the start and
it’s not something that they would have
to do it just becomes
part of the whole process right exactly
okay so we know that all those cities
are supposed to be built for everyone
they are
most of the time thought planned and
designed by man
so tove how would you define an
inclusive urban planning
and can you tell me a bit more how is
her city contributing to
pushing forward these ideas of
inclusivity
yeah i think that crystal really
mentioned it in her answer
before because it’s all about involving
vulnerable groups in the process of
urban planning
and not only thinking about the the
built city and the big public space
as an end product but also involving
vulnerable groups
rather it be women and young young women
and
and girls that we’re working with or
migrants or people with disabilities or
whichever group and these groups have to
be able to
define their own needs and implement it
in the urban planning processes
for city to actually become inclusive
maybe just to add like there’s i mean
there is no
wrong way of having men designing cities
as long as they include the the right
groups in the planning
uh you know it doesn’t it doesn’t have
to be that we’re advocating only for few
main architects at the end of the day
that’s not the issue we want men to be
part of the discussion
if men not are not on board we’re not
going to have her city
this is the reality of many contact in
many contexts around the world so
it’s really the importance about the
whole life life cycle of the project and
who’s included and who’s given the voice
to actually
transform those cities
yeah so it’s more about diversity and
my question for you kyra is if given the
chances obviously girls will plan and
design with different needs in mind
and what you think are the components or
the ideas
that you might notice more in a female
designed city and do you think that
there are some global concerns brought
to the table by women from all around
the world yeah uh
so i mean we’ve been working in
different contexts and uh
it’s interesting to see that actually
there are some
common grounds in the needs of the girls
and i mean women around the world
experience the public space in a
completely different way from a man
because they have to face different
challenges uh
that are uh not taken for granted
well they are taken for granted for men
let’s say which is
freedom of use for instance or or safety
or
representation like women don’t feel uh
safe the most of the time to walk around
the city
in the night or in certain areas of the
public space
or they don’t feel like free
to use the public space or spend the
time they want to spend
in a public space because there are
certain uh silent
rules or invisible rules that are not
supposed to
be there but like what is interesting of
the women mind that somehow is not only
it’s a person he’s an individual it’s an
adult but it’s also a worker
he’s also a mother is also a friend so
they she really i think has
a comprehensive way of what are the
needs of a girl and but not only a girl
so she thinks about what what’s lighten
she thinks about lightning she thinks
about having a safe
space to that can see their children
running
she sees she needs
ramps to access to increase
accessibility for
children and strollers but uh therefore
becomes social sensibility for
wheelchairs users and she needs
uh toilets public toilets because uh i
mean we’re women and uh
as as women we need it the most but uh
finally it’s a basic need for everybody
and um yeah and then she needs to
to enjoy the the public life as well so
she wants to meet the friends
in a nice place and uh with uh with some
greenery
that uh provides shades and so on and so
forth i mean there are so many literal
aspects that uh
women i think women are really able to
capture
uh what are the basic needs that finally
reflects to
the basic needs of the old society true
and
just like he said with basic different
needs men and women expect different
outcomes
from their urban surroundings going back
to the platform right now
so um from what i’ve seen the process
seems pretty simple can you walk us
through the different phases
yeah absolutely so the toolbox is built
with
nine very flexible blocks and they’re
divided into three phases
so first you have the assessment phase
it’s where you start with the
stakeholder mapping that kristen
mentioned earlier
just to make sure that all the right
people are invited to partake in the
process
and both stakeholders and target groups
and then you continue with a
city-wide assessment and a site-specific
public assessment
so you locate the public space that you
will work in
and that is in most native action and
then
in phase two we have the design phase
and that’s where you analyze the
challenges
detected during the assessment phase so
you design
solutions for the public space
and this is where you find the block by
block minecraft workshop
and for instance and other design
thinking tools such as
method kit just to mention one and you
also prioritize among these ideas and
formulate recommendations for action
and and this is all done together with
the stakeholders and
and the girls and the third phase is
implementation so you work with them
with
some plans and implementation of the
solutions you start construction
and you also share results with the
community at large
and then after six months or so you also
do a follow-up and evaluation of the
process
so that’s it
simple i would say quite simple yeah
nine bucks
very yeah we tried to think of
everything so it’s quite comprehensive
even though it’s um very like clear what
to do
and who can actually access this toolbox
and
who should lead the process i would ask
so
uh you have uh the the website is pretty
straightforward so you have a general
overview of the entire process
then you have a registry uh option when
you
can create your own account whether you
are the project team
who is leading like who’s fascinated i
think the whole process
you would create the her city let’s say
nairobi or her city beirut or her city
johannesburg
and then you would invite also the girls
to be uh
to register as one and log in in order
to put their data
or their information throughout the life
cycle of the
of the process so it’s pretty much open
for everyone we do support in some cases
some cities that want to collaborate
directly with us but
again it is a free of use it is open
source so anyone could log in anyone can
start your city today
basically to know that it’s an open
source
and what are the cities that are already
on the platform
and how has been the experience so far
um so let’s say that the idea of the
project in general right now is to
uh implement the platform and try and
like pilot it
uh in three different cities and
right now we have on board the
johannesburg municipality
and uh beirut and fleming
fleming ferry in uh sweden
and then a few cities in palestine that
are also
uh trying out uh the toolbox the
different tools and see how it
uh how it’s working and after after this
uh
after this phase we will review the
toolbox and see how
how what to change and how to make it
better and better
but again i want to just echo the idea
that um
the platform is free and open source so
everybody can just log in and start
their
her city now and um make uh
incre increase the participation of uh
girls and young women
in in any urban planning process so it’s
quite
uh yeah this is quite uh interesting for
us as well
and um yeah and uh the idea is also that
uh later on we will have some
original uh training so that
we can also try to uh tailor even better
the
the the service that we are providing uh
for different contexts and different
needs
so finally what are the main sdgs at
stake here and how does this open
platform contribute to the 2030 agenda
yeah so there’s many sdgs that we are
contributing to
uh by doing the her city process the
overarching one would be the sdg 11
on sustainable cities and communities
especially the target 7 which is
providing accessible safe inclusive and
green public spaces for everyone
in particular women and children there’s
sdg5 on gender equality so making sure
all groups are included
in the discussion and shaping their
cities there’s the sdg
3 on hands and wellbeing by providing
more clean
and safe spaces that are enjoyable by
everyone
not to mention also sdg10 reducing
inequality
so we’re providing more equal
opportunities
uh to access different basic services at
the city level
and finally as the g7 on partnerships
through the her city project
we were like uh forming partnership and
discussions
between different entities at the
different level of the city
so with strong partnership we strengthen
means of implementation and maintenance
but more importantly we ensure
upscaling uh so in a nutshell those are
like the main ones but at the nokia
level it’s also contributing to a wider
um wider contribution yeah
like you already named like a bunch of
scg sdgs if not like most of them so
i think this open platform is a great uh
contribution
to cities uh worldwide uh kyaratov
and krista thank you for sharing your
thoughts and for explaining to us more
about
the her city platform any last words you
want to share with our audience
no we welcome everyone to start their
her city today
they have a link in the article of
course everyone can log
in and start using her city it’s pretty
simple i tried it
and it’s very visually also
interesting i would say thank you
christine
thank you thank you yourself thanks for
having us
thank you girls it was a pleasure having
you and talking with you