Evaluation of Functional Components Affecting Women's Presence in Urban Neighborhoods with a Gender Justice Approach: Case Study Involving Sarshur and Isargaran-Hejab Neighborhoods in Mashhad, Iran

Abstract

The importance of the presence of women in urban spaces, because they are half of the world's population and must enjoy full citizenship rights, is obvious; therefore, recognition and understanding of the requirements for their presence in urban space are considered to be one of the most essential principles during the planning and design of public urban spaces regardless of gender inequalities. Designing the appropriate structure for neighborhoods with a gender equality approach is a factor that affects the increased presence of women in urban spaces and neighborhoods, a generalization that could be extended to the whole city. Therefore, people's presence in neighborhoods will be investigated in this study with respect to the functional components that influence gender equality from women's perspectives. The objective of this study is to assess the most preferable functional components in urban neighborhoods that increase the presence of women. In addition, to prevent the creation of single-gender spaces, the objectives are to identify effective criteria regarding the presence of women in neighborhoods and ranking neighborhoods in terms of the importance of gender. This study will be carried out based on a descriptive analytical method and the required data will be collected using a Likert scale in the form of questionnaire items for two neighborhoods, which include Sarshur, Mashhad, Iran (old fabric), Isargaran, and Hejab, Mashhad, Iran (new fabric). The results of this study indicate that the Isargaran-Hejab neighborhood is in a better situation than the Sarshur neighborhood. Between the functional components, the relationship between land use and urban form had the highest impact with an average score of 6.40 on the presence of women and the quality of behavior (activity compatibility, time, and space) with a mean of 2.13 had the least impact on it. In addition, based on Spearman’s rank correlation coefficient, with a value of 0.473, the presence of women has a significant relationship with gender justice, which increased with the increase in gender justice in the neighborhood.