In Donostia-San Sebastian there are very few names of women on the street, and many of them are families of kings and queens, or religions. With this statement, the Women's and City Forum has created an interactive map to make visible the lack of women on the street in the city. The project arose from practices of the Master's Degree in Equality of Women and Men of the UPV/EHU in the Emakumeen Etxea association of Donostia. Maialen Ruiz Prada carried out these practices in the group against the violence La Antiagresiones and in the Foro Mujeres y Ciudad. In this last group we found the technique of equality of the City of Donostia, Ana Txurruka, and the two have worked on this project. Both are currently members of the Forum.

The map has two main objectives: on the one hand, to make visible the women who are in the street gazetter and public spaces of the city and, on the other, to recognize them. “It’s not enough to have women’s names, it’s also important to know who they are,” Txurruka said. In total, there are 894 streets, plazas, corridors, etc. in Donostia-San Sebastian, 49 of which are known as women and 285 of men. Ruiz Prada has pointed out that it is difficult to know concrete data because the criteria can be very varied:?women and men with specific names, trades related to each gender, etc. However, the approximate data indicate that?all the streets that appear on the street represent 37% of the people, of which approximately 32% are men and 5% are women.

When Ruiz Prada started his practice at the Forum, they were preparing a project called Jane ibilaldia [the march organized around the world in honor of the urbanist Jane Jacobs], and what he saw caused him a lot of curiosity:?I wanted to know what the number of streets with the name of woman in the street in San Sebastian would be. He explained that he spoke to Txurruka and informed him of the street in San Sebastian that the Society of Sciences Aranzadi built in 2011. ‘This report has been of great help, but I needed another kind of work to achieve the goals I wanted. On the one hand, the report is 2011 and is not up to date. On the other hand, the report is made up of texts, and we think that doing something more interactive today would be very effective," he said. In addition, they have taken a step further and wanted to go further:?In addition to the names of the streets and public spaces collected in the Aranzadi report, they have collected elements that indicate the presence of women, such as murals where women appear.

Interactive map

The interactive map Donostia.eus, developed by Ruiz Prada with the support of the Forum, has been distributed in six blocks:?streets, walks, hallways and the like; women's trades; other elements; sculptures; parks and squares. The map offers two options to visualize the elements: on the one hand you can see all the elements at once and on the other hand you can see the elements by groups, for example, only parks and squares. Each set has been represented with a different symbol. “The construction of the map has been very important because it graphically shows what the symbolic presence of women in our city is,” said Ruiz de Prada.

In addition, some of the women on the map have an entry into the Wikipedia digital encyclopedia, and through its symbol you can access the corresponding links. The project therefore has a dual role: to disseminate information about these women and to raise awareness of the gender gap in this encyclopedia. “The gender gap is very large, both on the part of the editors and in terms of content, and to deal with it, groups such as WikiWomen and WikiEmakumeok have been created,” explains Ruiz Prada.

As you have explained, the starting point of the map was a performance of the Forum at a festival Rompeolas in Bilbao. On a large panel on the Boulevard, the map of San Sebastian was placed and citizens were invited to place the gomets on the streets they knew. “We realized that the streets that people knew had a masculine name and were located in the middle below those of women,” said Ruiz Prada. The result of this activity has been confirmed after completing the map and, in addition, they have reached many others. On the one hand, they have observed that public spaces with the name of women are located far from the city centre, in peripheral areas and in areas where people do not live.

It is important to ensure the presence of women, but Txurruka also believes that the presence of these spaces should be taken into account in the daily life of citizens: “General Prim’s street, for example, is in the everyday lives of many people, as there are homes and shops, but the passage of Gloria Fuerte in Bidebieta is a small alley through which very few people pass.” They have confirmed that this has a very high symbolic weight, as if someone does not use these names, they have a direct influence on visibility. “The same is true of the Benita Asas de Egia square, if it does not have a portal and if there is no meeting point for citizenship, the normalization of the presence of this woman will not be guaranteed”, explained the technique of Equality.

To explain this conclusion, they have set another clear example. The last municipal plenary of this legislature decided to put the name of the promotora and euskaltzale of the ikastolas Karmele Esnal to a small garden of Gros, after approving the proposal of EH Bildu linked to the street. Karmele Esnal, born in Orio in 1932, came to live in Donostia-San Sebastián as a child. After studying as a teacher, he began to work in teaching in the 1950s, with the help of Elbira Zipitria. He was an important driver of the ikastolas in the city and from 1965 he worked in the Holy Lyceum until his retirement. “It will be called the garden that I have always called triangulo, but I think no one will use it,” says Ruiz Prada. He added that the deficit in Gros is very significant and that, as it is a long-built neighborhood, it is very difficult to change the names of the streets. However, there are other options, such as the placement of new sculptures.

In the new neighborhoods that are being built in the city, there has been a great opportunity to increase the presence of women. In Txominenea, for example, they have reported that three of the new streets they have formed have been baptized with the name of woman. “To compensate for the current situation, all the streets of Txominenea should have a woman’s name and yet we didn’t equate it,” says Txurruka in laughter.

On the other hand, they have observed that many of the women that appear on the map are families and relatives of the kings or of the Christian religion:?Parque Cristina Enea, Avenida Isabel II.aren, calle Virrey Reina, statue of Reina María Cristina, calle de la Infanta Beatriz, etc. “According to our calculations, those linked to monarchy and religion are a quarter, and the number is very high if only women are taken into account,” explains Ruiz Prada. For Txurruka this has to do with the city model of San Sebastian and its symbolism: "The historically bourgeois and monarchic character of San Sebastian is an example of this, the name of the public space". The Equality technique is convinced that it will cost a lot to achieve secularism in this area, but that it is "very important" to put these issues on the table.

Ongoing

The Women’s and City Forum started working on the city, urbanism and mobility from a gender perspective in 1997, and have since achieved many achievements in this area. The forum brings together women of different profiles and areas: lawyers, historians, architects, anthropologists, who have worked in mobility, who come from associations of women from the neighborhoods, etc. Txurruka has explained that this allows us to look at the city from another perspective: "We talk about the needs of women, but not only about the needs of women. That is, if we see and internalize the needs of women in vulnerable situations, we will achieve a much more inclusive city.” In short, taking into account the needs of the most vulnerable groups, it will also be possible to ensure the needs of the rest of the population.

In addition, they have explained that the needs of women are closely linked to the needs of other groups. “Most cities are created to respond to the needs of capitalist productivity and not to favor care among people. Thus, so far they have worked in two main areas, always from the feminist point of view: in the material and symbolic aspect of urbanism. In this first paragraph, for example, they pointed out that the Forum’s demands allowed children’s cars to have direct access to the city’s public buses. In the second, the City Hall of Donostia-San Sebastian has made several proposals, one of them being to name the gardens of Satrustegi Avenue in the Old Town. Txurruka has explained: 'We have proposed that the name of a woman be named in that area where there was a petrol station before, and although there are few houses in that area, the taxi station is there.' It is convinced that this will have an impact on the visibility mentioned above.

Other agents of the city are also aware of the importance of the street in the popular imagination and work in the same area. For example, the Feminist Assembly of Gros took action on 8 March, International Women’s Day. On the occasion of the feminist strike, the Gros strikers carried out several demanding activities throughout the morning. Among other things, they changed the names of the Okendo House of Culture and the Paseo de Colón with banners and stickers, “because military men, colonizers and oppressors do not deserve a place of honor.” Instead of proper names, the activists put to the house of culture the name of the Donostian artist Esther Ferrer and Berta Cáceres, the Honduran environmental activist, Paseo de Colón. Txurruka and Ruiz Prada have underlined the achievements of years of struggle, but have underlined that much remains to be done.

The Equality technician believes that we're at a "very interesting time," right now, because Donostia is changing in a lot of things. In his opinion, it is essential that citizens reflect on the city model that we want, and that one of the keys to this is the reflection on the tourism model:?"If we want cities that put care at the centre, and if we want cities that are sustainable for all people, it is clear that we should work together. We have great challenges in San Sebastian.”

They have announced that they will continue to develop a project to translate the public space nomenclature into an interactive, open map, pulling that thread, with the aim of achieving an inclusive city.