Safer Streets: Enabling Active Travel and Active Lives for Women and Girls

By GreaterSport | 27 July 2022 | TAGS: funding, safer streets, active travel

GreaterSport’s Safer Streets project will be delivered in partnership with Trafford Council, Open Data Manchester and a number of local stakeholder groups, running from September 2022 to September 2023.

The local community will be at the heart of the project which will be further shaped through a participatory co-design process in the Autumn.

We've been awarded £490,448 to deliver the project to include community engagement posts in the neighbourhood and commissioning local arts groups. 

This project is one of five successful bids across Greater Manchester totalling an investment of £2,400,856 to tackle anti-social behaviour and make streets safer for residents across the city-region.

Across the Country the Home Office are investing £50million through the Safer Street Fund.

Eve Holt, Strategic Director GreaterSport said,

“We’ve been having lots of conversations with people and partners across Greater Manchester to better understand how we create the conditions for Active Lives for All.

Women and girls have pointed to a number of changes that are needed to widen their access and participation in all forms of physical activity to include active travel and sport. 

Making public spaces and streets safe and welcoming places where women and girls feel they belong has emerged as a key priority.

This project provides an opportunity to involve people and partners in place and to grow as a movement for change. We’ll be testing out various interventions, including participatory street audits, arts installations and bystander training.

We’ll be spreading and growing the conversation, to include mass walks and cycle rides, and a podcast series for men and boys to share what they are doing to help shift culture and behaviour.

There is a role for everyone. If you’d like to get involved get in touch.”

Trafford is renowned for its sports and culture and were recently the proud hosts for the opening game of the Women’s Euros on 6 July 2022. 

Trafford Councillor and exec member for Culture, Leisure and Strategic Partnerships, Joanne Harding said,

”This is great news for everyone in our borough. One of our main priorities is that all our communities are happy, healthy and safe and this funding will do a lot to secure that. No-one should face barriers to being involved in the many culture and sport opportunities Trafford has to offer just because they don’t feel safe getting there. Therefore, it’s massively important that the funding we have helped secure is used to make sure our sport and cultural events are accessible, and women and girls are safe and feel safe when walking our streets.”

Data and insight shows that more work needs to be done to design moving into people’s lives.  Activity levels across the population mirror patterns of wider inequality, with significant gaps between activity levels for men and women and boys and girls, which widen further when gender intersects with multiple barriers experienced by people with disabilities and long-term health conditions, our LGBTQ+ community, our older population, people living on low incomes, and culturally diverse communities including people of African, Caribbean or South Asian heritage. 

Julian Tait, CEO of Open Data Manchester CIC said,

"We are really pleased to be given the opportunity to work with the people of Trafford as a home to a wide variety of sporting and cultural venues - from the internationally famous to the community-focussed. We hope through the Safer Streets programme we will be able to understand residents and visitors experience of accessing sporting opportunities in Trafford, and support them in creating an environment where everyone can participate"

Local women and girls and women’s organisations have told us that this presents a ‘once-in-a-lifetime’ opportunity to raise awareness of women and girls’ experience of violence against women and girls, in particular street harassment, as a key barrier to their access and participation in football, sports and cultural events. 

Convenor and Trustee for GM4Women2028, Helen Pankhurst said,

“Ensuring the safety of women and girls is designed into the planning and operation of our streets, public spaces and parks across Greater Manchester, is one of our key GM4Women2028 priorities for 2022-3 and is a focus of our efforts across both our Culture and Active Lives Group and our Safety group this year. We know we can make Greater Manchester a better place for women and girls. This project has the potential to help us collectively achieve that.”