16.10.19
Earlier I had the pleasure of speaking with Claudia Prinz-Brandenburg from the City of Vienna’s Architecture and Urban Design department (MA18).
She holds a degree in landscape planning, and having previously practiced in a landscape planning office she has now worked for the City of Vienna since 1997. In 1998 she became the coworker of Eva Kail in the “Co-ordination Office for Planning and Construction Geared to the Requirements of Daily Life and the Specific Needs of Women”. In 2010 she became the Gender expert in the “Building Construction Group” of the Executive Group for Construction and Technology in the City of Vienna. Her main fields of work are gender aspects in subsidised housing projects, public space including urban open space and parks as well as open space for schools and kindergartens.
It is clear that Claudia has a strong commitment to the principles of gender sensitive planning and was a key person in driving forward the progress that the city achieved. From her I got really detailed insights on how key people navigated the political context, and also how the structure and organisation of the women’s office changed over time and how this affected the work they were able to do. It’s clear that with the prominence of other planning issues, such as the climate crisis, rising up the agenda, that the focus on Gender Mainstreaming has reduced in importance. But nevertheless, it is promising that a legacy remains and some issues continue to be considered by officers across all parts of the municipality as it is now ingrained in their way of thinking.
The full transcript from our interview is below.
NP: Perhaps it would be helpful if I start by telling you a little bit about what I’m doing and why I’m doing it. Every other year our professional institute gives out this travel grant to research a topic related to urban planning of your choosing. And for me I was interested in gender and urban planning. When I started I didn’t really know where I would go, and then through doing research I discovered Vienna had so much guidance, and so that’s how I came to be here. As a mandatory outcome I have to produce a report of a few thousand words. But personally I am particularly interested in what lessons we can take and apply in practice in London. That’s my hope from this. Could you start by saying a little bit about your role here and describing what you do?
CPB: So my role has actually changed quite a bit in the time that I have been in the city. I worked with Eva Kail and Elisabeth Irschik for a long time, but two years ago I moved to this department, and I am not as focused on Gender Mainstreaming anymore. It was not my choice, but it happened. Sometimes when Eva Kail is occupied, I still do presentations on Gender Mainstreaming, but my day-to-day work now is on greening buildings — it’s a new field of work for me.
I started with Eva Kail in the 90s, in 1998. In the “Coordination Office for Gender Planning”. And my areas of work were housing and also parks and urban open space. Do you know about the pilot district? Part of the pilot district included parks in the district. And the main success for us with regards to planning and urban parks were the recommendations we designed together with the parks department in Vienna. It was a long process. We started with a competition for two different existing parks to be redesigned. We always tried to develop things together with those who had to apply it — that was a very important part. So it was not a case of ‘we have designed it and here is the result and now apply it’. But instead, so that other colleagues could learn and see it’s useful and adopt it in other different ways, rather than just giving it to other departments as a ‘to-do’ for them.
NP: So you were working from the coordination office, and you were working with the other departments?
CPB: Yes from the coordination office we organised the meetings, and the results were the recommendations. And there are still new parks being redesigned using these. All of them more or less follow these ideas. But it’s one step to for the recommendations to be implemented and successful, but it’s another thing for it to be maintained and sustained. Over the years you lose people in departments, and so it’s getting more difficult. We did not put in place monitoring after a few years to see how it was working, that would have been a good step. But it’s a question of having enough people to do all this work. Now that I have left the office, Eva Kail is more or less the only person who is officially responsible for Gender Planning in the city now. And she has many other things to do, so though monitoring would be very helpful, including to strengthen and remind the people of these recommendations, unfortunately the money is not there.
NP: So it’s down to the resourcing?
CPB: Yes, definitely. A lack of resources.
NP: So you mentioned the restructuring as a result of which you are now working in this department. What was the reason that restructuring came about?
CPB: The reason was the head of the department where the Coordination Office is situated changed. And also the general opinion with regards to the role of the Coordination Office changed too. There was a perception that the ‘Pilot Project’ phase had now finished, and the next step was ‘Mainstreaming’. So the first step was that Elisabeth and I we were situated in different parts of this department (MA18 — Architecture and Urban Planning), and the idea was that we would implement gender ideas in the groups we were placed within. But as just one person responsible for gender mainstreaming it became more difficult as a sole person. You don’t have the support of a group. From my point of view, it was not a very helpful step for the idea of gender mainstreaming.
NP: And was that fed back to the Head of the Department, that it was not so helpful? When it became evident to you that it became less successful, was there any discussion about how to approach it in a better way?
CPB: It was the point of view of the Head of this Department that Eva Kail is still there and she can cover this topic, and that is adequate.
NP: And what do you think the reason is of the shift of that perspective is?
CPB: Other topics became more relevant. First we were called ‘the Co-ordination Office for Planning and Construction Geared to the Requirements of Daily Life and the Specific Needs of Women’ and then we had to change the name. ‘Women’ was considered too constricted, so ‘gender’ was what was better. And then other topics became more important, as Gender was well known then. You need new topics and new focuses also in the municipality- I imagine it’s the same as in the private sector, to a certain degree.
NP: That’s really interesting, the thing around language is something I have been thinking about. One of the things I have noticed about this, is you talk about ‘mobility’ in the STEP 2025, rather than ‘transport’. I don’t know whether that was a conscious decision in the language used?
CPB: We also could say transport, it’s also a word we use in German. I think it’s as a result of a discussion that it’s called mobility, so little ones and old ones, and all groups in Vienna are included. I think it’s a result of a discussion.
NP: In London we talk about ‘inclusive’ planning, there’s no real focus on gender, so considering disabled people, and ethnic minorities, and sexuality, in our legal requirement there is ‘protected characteristics’ — so all of those. The feeling I sense from speaking to people in the UK is that because of the term we use is wider, the results get watered down.
CPB: Watered down, that’s a very good expression! Like ‘design for all’.
NP: Has that been your experience here?
CPB: No, here it was not replaced by design for all. People in town planning departments took parts of Gender Planning that they could identify with and went on and used these ideas and these principles alongside other matters. It’s difficult for people to use the expression ‘gender,’ it’s not a German word, and you have to explain it. But yes, some ideas, which planners can follow the guidelines for and they can identify with, they use it in their planning. Even if Gender Planning is not that popular anymore in Town Planning in Vienna, it had and it still has an influence. Certain criteria are used and people do not question. They can identify with it and they don’t think twice about using it.
NP: So it’s a natural thing that gets done by default. You mentioned there were particular aspects that people identified with. Can you give me some examples?
CPB: One example was , fear of crime. I saw it raised in discussions with other people from whom I wouldn’t have expected it; they brought this issue into the discussion. They argued over why a path should go this way, and not another way. And in the department for lighting too, this issue became more and more important, and was accepted as an important argument.
NP: You’ve mentioned a number of different departments you had to collaborate with. I’m interested to know more about how you brought all the different departments together at the time you were working together?
CPB: The pilot district is a good example, we organised projects, with the different departments, and so they didn’t work together but, all the departments worked together with us.
NP: So you were really acting in a coordinating role?
CPB: Exactly.
NP: And so with the pilot project I saw that there are 60 which were completed, though I couldn’t find information on them all. But I’ve gone and visited quite a few, for example Einsiedler Park. It was interesting you were talking about the monitoring as well — that there is no monitoring. When was Einsiedler Park undertaken?
CPB: The design of Einsiedlung park was around 2000.
NP: Ah okay so it was 20 years ago — but you can still see that the openings of the gates to the ball courts being much wider is very effective. And you suggested that some of these recommendations are still taken forwards — on some of the bigger projects how is what you learnt from this taken forward? So for example on Nordbahnhof, or Aspern Seestadt.
CPB: As far as I know Eva Kail was part of the [competition] jury for Hannah Arendt Park [in Aspern Seestadt] when it was being decided. And the planners who joined these competitions, they get this information as one of a wider set of information when they start to plan. They get it from the department for parks. So it’s still a basis for them to plan with. The external designers get the criteria .
NP: So in the competitions it was talked about that sometimes these criteria are used as the basis of how the competitions are evaluated.
CPB: Now there is no more evaluation during the competition concerning these criteria. Though it was the case previously. For example in Einsiedler Park, one of the pilot projects, it was a very important criteria to look at when we were evaluating the different sketch proposals. But now it’s not so important.
NP: And do any of the criteria which are being used now to evaluate take any lessons from any of this?
CPB: Not all of them, but some people have it ingrained in their minds still.
NP: So you were saying now that other things are taking a bigger priority. For example I guess climate change, and I guess affordable housing. How would these issues interact with gender planning considerations if they conflict.
CPB: I don’t have any examples of that. For sure the climate change issue is much more important now. It depends on the person. I work with people working on Smart Cities and Climate Change, and they try to combine it. It really depends on the people who are working on the projects.
NP: And with the people, you said there’s been a change in the people. Is there a pattern in who is taking these issues into consideration more? For example, is it mainly women, or is there a generational divide?
CPB: I think there are more women, but there are also men who try to follow these ideas. In terms of generation, it doesn’t depend on the age, but perhaps how long they have been in the municipality, and if they have participated in the discussions about gender planning. If they came later, it’s more difficult. Because I think it was very well known at the time we were active. Lots of people in the municipality were informed about this topic. To those people maybe they still think about it and know about it. And younger people who don’t know that the discussions took place, or what they covered, they don’t think about it the same amount.
NP: And you mentioned there was a group of people at the time you were active, there was more discussion around that. I’m interested to know what you think it was about that particular point in time, that meant that the women’s office got support?
CPB: One key point is that Eva Kail was a very well respected person in the municipality. She was a leader of a department before, The Department for Women’s Affairs, and then she had two children, and everything changed. As a former leader of a department, you have a good standing in the municipality. It would be very different if, for example, I had to lead the coordination office. So it was very important that she had held this position previously. And the support from the politicians. Department leaders have to follow the ideas of the politicians, so if a politician says that Gender Mainstreaming is an important topic and that they have to work with the Coordination Office, then they do it. So the interest from politicians was incredibly helpful. And we also got money from the Department for Women’s Affairs at that time. And other department leaders had to invest in projects concerning Gender Mainstreaming, and we had different politicians who supported us.
NP: So thinking again about the types of politicians who supported you. Was it mainly women, or particular political parties, or a generational thing?
CPB: No. There were three main supporters I would say. Including two men, and I think for them they thought it was a topic which could be popular. And they calculated it could help them.
NP: So it was a political move in some ways?
CPB: Yes. But also Eva Kail had a good relationship with them, so they trusted her — they trusted that it would be an output they could present. As politicians, they always have to present something and show people what has happened. And we had to produce the materials that were the basis for these presentations.
NP: And is that why the focus started from the pilot projects specifically? It seems as though it started from projects and then filtered up into more general guidance rather than the other way around. Do you think that was because it was starting from trying to get political support?
CPB: Yes absolutely. You cannot show this [Gender Mainstreaming guidance] as an output. But projects are an output that you can point to and feel and see, and are important for the politicians.
NP: And were they at the district level, or city level, or a combination?
CPB: A combination, but more at the city level. On the other hand for the pilot district, it was combined with some money from the city, so when there were additional budgets involved the district level politicians then became more interested.
NP: Was that how all of the pilot projects were funded?
CPB: No there was not always additional money. For example parks money always comes from the City Level, even if it’s in a certain district the money is from the city level. But if streets are re-designed its money from the district level. The head of the pilot district supported us very much. She also invest much of the district money into these projects. By the head I mean a politician. There’s no additional level of officials working at the district level.
NP: Were there any projects where you were trying to get money from both the district and city level, and how does that work?
CPB: For Einsiedler park it was not easy to get the money from the city level. And it was more or less a gift for the district. But it didn’t succeed very often — that was a special case. The park was redesigned as a result of the need for a pilot project for gender mainstreaming. If there hadn’t been a need for this project then the park would have stayed the same.
NP: So you mentioned that not all 60 projects got additional funding. So how did you bring them about?
CPB: We just implemented the ideas. We worked together with people who had to rebuild the streets, from the relevant departments and discussed with them how wide the path for pedestrians was and all of these details. Always with the idea to improve their work. So for example if they needed to repair a path they would widen these, so gradually over time all paths got widened. And for example in the pilot district the district mayor focused on it, and tried to do as much as she could with her money. So the redesign of the streets was a key idea and a main project for her. And they were always using the ideas of gender mainstreaming.
NP: And you talked about in competitions, for example in Hannah Arendt Park, that they have the criteria for gender sensitive planning. Is that the same for housing. Is that the same for housing development?
CPB: No, only if they get the money from the city, only if it is subsidised.
NP: So in terms of the guidelines from the city, is it just about the height?
CPB: Yes. There are minimum sizes and standards on how much daylight, which is in the law. That is just for Vienna. We have 9 different ‘Bauordnungen’ in Austria and all the architects find it tricky.
NP: But I guess it gives you more autonomy to make your own in this city?
CPB: Yes. And the situation in Vienna is very different to the rest of Austria. Because we are the most densely built city in the whole country. So we need a very different Ordnung.
NP: Another topic I wanted to touch on was about participation.
CPB: I have a good photo of a good participation process. It’s very important to involve people in the beginning. And before planning starts. And there are meetings. This is a meeting concerning the urban development in Attemsgasse. And they it was organised by a planning office, and they designed these kinds of symbols to make it easier for people to say what they want just with signs. And it makes also easier to compare the opinions so that you have restricted number of signs. And it is easier to use them afterwards. And in the beginning concerning the parks, there was no participation, because we didn’t have enough time. So we had to start the competition very quickly and we asked different groups who were there street workers and children and young people and old people who were organised and mothers who were organised, and we asked the priest, lots of different groups. We did a workshop and collected the ideas and the problems around the park. This was the short form of participation of the different groups there. And now we would have meetings where people can really say what they want.
NP: So the role of participation is becoming increasingly important. What’s the reason for this?
CPB: It’s the wish of the politicians. I think it makes it easier to argue afterwards. You can say you had the opportunity to participate and that’s the result. So it’s also from this perspective why there is participation. But we also have masterplanning participation. Eva Kail was very involved in the development of the masterplan. It’s not only in gender projects that participation takes place. In these gender mainstreaming projects we have very much a focus on which groups are present. And which are not present. And if they don’t come, we also try to find forms of participation which fit different groups. And so you have to find a way to communicate with youngsters, young people, in a different way to old people. There are different formats. And that’s a very important when the participation takes place in gender planning projects.
NP: And I guess that’s quite resource intensive again.
CPB: Usually the resourcing is not from the municipality, it’s from the private sector. There are offices who specialise in communication and public engagement. I remember a participation process relating to a park redesign and they really tried to get the same amount of boys and girls. And even during the participation process, they tried to make the girls talk and ask them specifically. And when the boys were talking most of the time and saying what they wanted, the designers said, ‘okay stop, and now girls what do you want?’ It’s really a specialised kind of work. You have to remember the focus of gender, even on this level.
NP: Yes we struggle with similar things it’s really difficult. And ethnic minorities as well. So to wrap up, is there anything else about gender sensitive planning, that we have not covered that we should have covered?
CPB: I think you have a good overview now.
NP: That’s been really useful, particularly to understand how it has changed over time. I suppose Elisabeth who I spoke to previously joined the office after you did, so perhaps you know more about what happened before she joined. And Maria Vassilakou provided a perspective from a politician. So it’s been very interesting to get a range of perspectives. Thank you very much.
Earlier this year I was awarded the RTPI George Pepler Award by the RTPI. The George Pepler Award is a bursary granted to a person in their first 10 years post qualification experience wishing to undertake a short period of study on a particular aspect of spatial planning. I was delighted to win the opportunity to carry out my research proposal entitled ‘What can the UK learn from Vienna with regards to adopting a gender mainstreaming approach to shape built outcomes?’ I am currently in Vienna for researching how Vienna has made itself more Gender Equal. #GenderEqualCities #RTPIGeorgePepler
