Transit Oriented Development (TOD) and Women's Security

Security is one of the major concerns in daily movement of women. Generally, public transportation means –such as metro and bus- are  relatively more secure compared with semi-public transportation means like shared taxi and van.  Public transportation in Iran is not efficient and  integrated enough to be sufficient for daily activities. This weakness is even more problematic  for women who generally have more complicated and various travel behavior compared with men, with relatively less access to private cars.  A major part of each trip relates to the station  and its peripheral area and the way it is designed. ”Transit Oriented Development“ )TOD( as a contemporary planning approach focuses on the interrelationship of settlement development  and public transportation, and introduces basic  urban design principles such as walkability, mix use and physical and social mixture, to provide a platform to enhance women presence and access to public transportation. The present paper  uses the physical criteria of TOD Standard joint  with mental concepts of interviews with local women to evaluate security of Ekbatan Metro Station area. The results indicate that majority  of interviewees prefer walking as a means to access the station and usually travel in day time  and in more crowded areas. As a conclusion, some strategies based one TOD principles have been introduced to enhance women presence both in day and night time.