Strengthening the impact of public space to improve health and wellbeing in Barcelona: an intersectional feminist approach

Stories of women from Sant Antoni and La Barceloneta during the Covid-19 pandemic

Watch this series of testimonials in which four women living in Barcelona–Lourdes, Maria Teresa, Alba and Nuria–explain their struggles during the pandemic and how their neighbourhoods changed during that period.

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FEMPUBLICBCN aims to understand the new relationships between public spaces and health equity in the context of the Covid-19 pandemic. The Covid-19 pandemic has aggravated social vulnerabilities and intersectional inequalities. In addition, with regular lockdowns and trends toward working from home, the importance of residential neighborhood environments may have been amplified, including time spent in nearby public spaces. At the same time, gentrification and touristification have slowed down.

Accordingly, the primary goal of the project is to understand if and how – in the context of the Covid-19 pandemic – changes in use and perception of public space have impacted the health and wellbeing of women and other marginalized gender residents facing different and multiple types of vulnerabilities in Barcelona. To do so, FEMPUBLICBCN will evaluate changes in use and perception of public space in two neighborhoods in Barcelona city: La Barceloneta and Sant Antoni, using a mixed method approach and creating an advisory council made up of neighbors from each neighborhood.

Moreover, using an intersectional framework, we will examine how changes in processes such as gentrification and touristification since the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic may have impacted the use of and benefits from public space, and in turn health equity.

This project is carried out in collaboration with the Col·lectiu Punt 6, a cooperative for feminist urbanism in Barcelona.

Research team:

Principal researchers: Helen Cole, Margarita Triguero-Mas
Collaborative researchers: Col·lectiu Punt6, Amalia Calderón-Argelich, Hanne Bisjak, Anaëlle Bueno, Sarah Bretschko, Laura Chica, Valeria Cuenca, Zsófia Ghira, Maria Iordanoglou, Emilia Lewartowska, Xènia Manzano, Aina Planas Carbonell, Lydia Prieto, Mary Rodgman, Magalí Touzet
Consultation: Isabelle Anguelovski, Jordi Honey-Rosés, James Connolly, Panagiota Kotsila

Objectives

  • Determine changes (before the Covid-19 pandemic and currently) in the use and perception of public spaces and gentrification/touristification among women and other marginalized gender residents.
  • Explore the interlinks between changes in the use of and perceptions around public spaces, perceived changes in touristification/gentrification, and women’s and other marginalized gender residents’ health equity.
  • Explore potential co-creation innovations and transformations for more just access to and benefit from public gathering places in Barcelona.
  • Disseminate study results via the development of visual multi-media material.

Expected research outputs

Our study will shed further light onto how (non)feminist urban planning can create and enhance environmental (in)justice patterns of health (in)equity for women, particularly those with intersecting vulnerabilities.

We expect that the high involvement of neighborhood residents in the study, from co-creation of data collection tools to data collection and future recommendations production, will provide new tools for neighborhood empowerment and neighborhood social cohesion (apart from small economic revenue to the neighborhoods we will be able to provide directly). We expect that those residents involved in data collection will be able to explore new professional profiles through the training, working experience, networking and exchanges opportunities that the project will offer and promote.

Moreover, we expect that FEMPUBLICBCN will contribute to improve public spaces in our cities to assure that all residents enjoy them and benefit from them.

Amb el suport de: