In the 1970s, in Berkeley, California, a group of disability rights activists called the Rolling Quads began dismantling curbs and improvising sidewalk ramps, demanding access for wheelchair users. But what people did not expect was that wheelchair users would not be the only ones to benefit from the intervention. Soon, pedestrians with baby strollers, heavy suitcases or simply with reduced mobility started using the ramps. Likewise, a gender-inclusive city works better for everyone. A city where all gender minorities of different ages and abilities can move around easily and safely, participate fully in the workforce and public life, live healthy, sociable and active lives, is a city that improves everyone's lives.

It is with this example that the Handbook for Gender-Inclusive Urban Planning and Design, published in 2020 by The World Bank, begins its last chapter. By proposing practical and theoretical strategies to create cities with gender inclusion, the handbook decouples urban design from the logic that makes the white and economically active man the “neutral” user of the city. Therefore, the initiatives presented by the guide seek to break with the perpetuation of patriarchal gender norms reflected in the city, patterns that began to be questioned in the 1970s, when feminist scholars in the US and Europe analyzed the ways in which urban planning excluded the needs of women. Nowadays, more than 50 years later, this discussion is urgent, and it touches other parameters including different minorities related to gender identity, such as transgender, agender, gender neutral, non-binary, etc.