Her City Guide: how to make urban planning inclusive

The war in Ukraine has had a particularly severe impact on women and girls: millions of people have become forcibly displaced (the majority of them women), destroyed infrastructure has limited access to basic services, and the unemployment rate among women has reached three-quarters of all those registered. This has increased the burden of unpaid care work, heightened the risks of sexual and gender-based violence, and at the same time restricted opportunities for women to participate in formal decision-making processes.
Despite these challenges, women and civil society are sustaining communities: repairing bomb shelters, organizing humanitarian aid, and maintaining local resilience. This is why ensuring their meaningful participation in recovery processes is so crucial.

The HerCity Guide is an international toolkit developed by UN-Habitat together with partners, offering methodologies and tools to involve girls and women in urban planning. It consists of nine blocks (assessment → design → implementation) and includes practical resources: templates, checklists, surveys, digital questionnaires, and visualizations.

Five principles for women’s participation in urban processes:
- Act systematically: from assessment to implementation.- Engage women as equal partners, not as a “target group.”- Use digital tools to ensure transparency and accessibility.- Clearly define the roles of all participants in the process.- Build partnerships between communities, municipalities, and experts.
Ro3kvit, together with partners from the Estonian Association of Architects and Shared City Foundation, has already tested elements of this methodology during the Urban Hackathon in Kalush. Our experience shows that gender-sensitive formats truly work and open up new opportunities for dialogue with communities.
The Ukrainian translation of "Her City: A Guide for Cities on Sustainable and Inclusive Planning and Design with Women's Needs in Mind" was carried out as part of the Baltpart project with the support of the United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN-Habitat) in Ukraine. In partnership with the Swedish Association of Architects “Sveriges Arkitekter”, the “Shared City” Foundation, the Estonian Association of Architects, and the NGO “Ro3kvit Urban Coalition for Ukraine”. With financial support from the Swedish Institute.