What might make parks feel safer and more welcoming?

Visiting parks is an integral part of everyday life, reflecting the vital social, health and recreational role parks play in towns and cities. Parks have numerous benefits for health and wellbeing yet concerns about safety can constrain women and girls’ use and experience of them.

Some 50 girls aged 13-18 years and 67 women aged 18-84 years from across West Yorkshire rated their agreement or disagreement with 49 statements about their local parks, which they arranged on a grid according to their own subjective viewpoint. Afterwards, participants reflected on why the statements were ‘like’ or ‘unlike’ their views. Participants who rate statements in a statistically similar way share a viewpoint.

A secondary aim of the research project was to explore the views of professionals involved in designing, managing and policing parks on women and girls’ safety. We wanted to find out what professionals think makes parks safe or unsafe for women and girls, and whether their views are similar or different from women and girls. Some 27 professionals from different services within local government and the police in West Yorkshire participated in our study.

Go to research report