Leslie Kern, Feminist City (London: Verso, 2020), p. 11

This for me was perhaps the least threatening route. There was security when I knew where I was going, and daylight provided good visibility. I had previous knowledge of how to travel through these areas safely. I had the chance to notice things that I had not previously.

This route chosen is a common path through the city for a young woman, often walked by students getting from a residential area though to amenities and recreational spaces. This image shows the tracked route alongside the OBOS data showing instances of sexual harassment. The data highlights West Street as a problematic area for women, with very few instances happening across the rest of the area.

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Figure 10: Map showing intended route with auto-ethnographic sketch OBOS harassment data by author Figure 11: Photograph of crossing between Crookes Valley Road and Crookesmoor Road by author Figure 12: Photograph of crossing on Crookes Valley Road by author

Figure 13: Diagram showing crossings by author

Despite this area being used by 47% full-time students, often pedestrians moving to and from 55 university buildings, there is obviously a priority given to cars which is evident in the crossing pictured in the first image. The time allocated to pedestrians to safely cross is significantly shorter than that allocated to cars, resulting in pedestrians stopping for long periods of time. While women deserve the opportunity to stop, they should not be forced to. This puts female pedestrians in a vulnerable position in which they could be subjected to sexual harassment and intimidation from the quasi-authoritative, protected position of a moving vehicle. This example of street 56 harassment, while not necessarily preventable in this instance, could be made less intimidating by using fluid zebra pedestrian crossing as shown in the second image, allowing an easy escape route from unwanted attention.57