I was facing
down a long afternoon with four kids under eight. A trip to the local coffee
shop was in order, and since it was less than a mile away, I did what any good
walkability advocate would do: I tossed all the kids in the mini-van and drove
there.
My choice,
like so many of women’s travel choices, was based primarily on safety. I was
confident the kids could walk that far, and I knew it would be the healthier
and more interesting choice for all of us--but without good walkability, I
wasn’t sure that I could keep them all safe.
All across
the country women, in particular mothers, make similar choices every day. Poor
street design, disparate land use, time constraints, lack of personal
safety—all of these conspire to force women off their feet and into cars. We
have built a transportation system that discounts women’s travel needs, and
women—and our communities—are suffering for it.
To
understand what we should be doing better, it’s important to understand how women’s travel is different from
men’s travel. Women
make more trips than men, but travel shorter distances. They travel more with
children, and their trips are more likely to be household-serving (e.g., shopping, daycare, errands), rather than
for work or leisure. Women are also more likely to trip-chain (stop at multiple locations along the way during one
trip). In particular for women with young children who haven’t started school,
gender drives travel patterns.
In theory, the
trips women take the most are ideally suited for walking. Short trips to the
school, grocery store, or similar locations should be simple to complete on
foot--and in the most walkable neighborhoods, women do walk a lot. However,
more often we’ve built walkablility out of our neighborhoods. Our streets lack
sidewalks where kids can walking hand-in-hand or be pushed in a stroller. We
fail to provide safe, regular crossing points along key routes. We create
neighborhoods where stores, schools, and (critically) childcare are too far
apart to be accessed on a single walking trip. We fail to consider the design
elements (lighting, lack of hidden spaces, etc.) that can deter crime and make
women feel safe while walking.
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Source: www.pedbikeimages.org/Dan Burden |
These
challenges have a real impact on women’s health. One
recent study investigated the physical activity patterns of over 700,000 people
in 111 different countries.
Using travel data from cell phone records, the researchers developed a measure
of activity inequality that quantified the difference between the most
physically active and least physically active portions of the population. Not
surprisingly, the US appears near the head of the list of least equal
countries, topped only by Egypt, Canada, Australia, and Saudi Arabia.
The study
found that the activity inequality measurement is an accurate predictor of
overall obesity levels within a country—countries that have high activity inequality have significantly more
obesity than countries with more equal activity levels.
Why do some
countries have higher activity inequality than others? In large part, because
of differences in physical activity between genders. In countries with high
activity inequality, women are much less physically active than men. The built
environment helps explain this disparity. The study showed that women are more
physically active in walkable places. Moreover, it found that in cities with
better walkability, activity inequality is lower and the gender gap between
physical activity starts to disappear. In other words, if we build cities that
allow women to walk safely, they will choose active travel—and overall health
will improve.
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Source: http://activityinequality.stanford.edu/ |
How can we
do that? Here are a few ways:
Study
women’s travel
Designing
transportation systems that encourage women to walk requires understanding how
women travel, and what drives those travel patterns. Without more research into
gender and transportation, we risk designing cities that ignore the needs of
half their population.
When
the predominant voices in transportation planning are men, it’s easier to
ignore women’s travel needs. Some ways that we can encourage more women to
participate in transportation planning are by meeting at the locations women
already visit regularly (e.g., schools), welcoming children into meeting spaces
or providing childcare during meetings, and ensuring women participate as
leaders and decision-makers in the transportation industry.
· Design
walkable neighborhoods
Women
will walk if they live in neighborhoods where they feel it is safe and
comfortable to do so. Places with sidewalks that are wide enough for strollers,
curb ramps, short street crossings, buffers along busy streets, and land uses
that are close together can all promote active travel by women. At the same
time, it’s important to address issues of personal safety and street harassment
that are often specific to women. Public spaces shouldn’t make women feel
vulnerable. Good lighting and visibility, more eyes on the street, and multiple
paths in and out of areas can help with this.
Taking these
steps might not solve all the challenges of inequality, but they’re a start.
And they might just mean that next time, I’ll walk with all those kids to the
coffee shop.
Further
Reading:
- Why do men and women travel differently? Study sheds light on gender differences
- Gender, race, and travel behavior: An analysis of household an analysis of household-serving travel and commuting in the San Francisco Bay Area
- Trip-Chaining, Childcare, and Personal Safety: Critical Issues in Women’s Travel Behavior
- Is It Safe to Walk Here? Design and Policy Responses to Women’s Fear of Victimization in Public Places
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