Un-Gendering the Everyday City

A growing body of academic literature brings to fore the exclusion of women from the public realm which further translates into their absence from public debate, policy and action. In Indian cities where vehicular ownership usually lies with men, streets are imagined around automobiles, thus invariably assuming the ‘universal citizen’ client to be male, car driving, leisurely, able bodied and wealthy. It thus becomes apparent that the street as a public space belongs more to a man than a woman. This studio focused on mapping and analyzing the sociospatial practices of gendered bodies in order to establish the unique challenges they face of access, leisure and safety in the city. The students systematically translated the outcome of this analysis into a clearly articulated design strategy and detailed out design drawings in order to propose a solution that enables equal access to the city.