Sara Ortiz Escalante is an activist and feminist researcher. She focuses her work on gender equity, urban planning and women’s safety. Since 2009, she works with Col·lectiu Punt 6, a group of feminist planners, architects and activists in Barcelona interested in rethinking cities, neighborhoods and the built environment in order to eliminate discrimination and include a gender perspective in local planning. She is also part of the International Advisory Council of Women’s in Cities International. As a consultant, she has conducted gender audits, equity plans and training on violence prevention with diverse audiences. Previously she worked with Las Dignas in El Salvador, community groups in rural Mexico, and with immigrant survivors in the United States. Sara holds a Sociology degree from the Autonomous University of Barcelona, a Diploma on Gender Relations from the National Autonomous University of Mexico and a Master in Urban Planning from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

The Col·lectiu Punt 6 has worked on urban planning from a gender perspective since 2005. The group started working in response to a new law approved in 2004 in Catalonia, the Neighborhood Law, which mandated cities to promote gender equity in the use of public space and facilities. During the presentation they will describe their approach to urban planning, and how they work to include women in the transformation of the built environment as subjects and experts of daily life and the urban environment. They will explain 3 main strategies they have developed to involve women and increase capacity building, and examples of participatory projects they have developed throughout these years.