Gender-sensitive use and development of (digital) participation and analysis tools for equal access to open spaces

In view of the growing threat posed by the effects of climate change on cities and regions, politicians and the public administration are increasingly called upon to create environmentally and climate-friendly as well as just framework conditions in urban spaces. The Covid-19 pandemic has underlined that urban green infrastructuresnot only benefit biodiversity, but arealso socially significant. In addition to providing a range of ecosystem services, they equally support the diverse usability of urban landscapes, thus affirming the right to the (climate just) city for all (Heindl 2022). Especially in denser settlement areas, where green and open spaces with important social and recreational functions are only available to a limited extent, different, sometimes contradictory needs of diverse social groups can lead to conflicts of use. Thereby, “vulnerable” persons or groups, who on average already have less access to high-quality green and open spaces anyway, often give way to the more dominant user groups. In this context, approaches such as gender-sensitive planning and design as well as attempts to design and manage public spaces sensitively according todiverse everydayneeds of the heterogenous urban populationare becoming increasingly important.

The research project "DraussenDaheim" (DDH) [German for: “At Home Outside”] is therefore developing a methodology and toolbox from a gender- and group-specific perspective, which serves not only the participatory evaluation of urban public spaces, but also the simulation-based development of different planning scenarios,which can, for example, be incorporated into space-time management concepts. Digital participation and simulation tools as well as tailor-made workshop designs are applied in the context of two Austrian use cases(Vienna, Zell am See) to identify spatio-temporal use patterns and group-specific requirements for the multifunctional use of space. In addition, the usability of the compiled tools (on the part of users and process facilitators) is tested. The methodology to be developed also builds on knowledge from a well-tested target group segmentation approach with a special focus on active mobility to more accurately capturethe mobility and information needs of the (vulnerable) groups involved.

This contribution gives a comprehensive insight into the project, its conceptual and methodological approach, and provides first results of use case specific surveys and tool-tests. From this, key findings are derived that address the potential of the gender-sensitive use and developmentof(digital) participation and analysis tools to supportequal and environmentally friendly access to open spaces in residential environments.