Businesses aren’t the only ones who are thinking about marketing to women… now, entire cities are jumping on board.

An article in USA Today discusses the trend of city planning to make urban areas safer and easier to navigate:

“Medical experts, concerned about increased rates of obesity, diabetes and hypertension, have studied how the design of cities affects health for some time. Now, they’re focusing on its impact on an increasingly prominent demographic segment of the urban landscape: women.”

Philadelphia has put together design teams to study the issue and come up with solutions, including repairing sidewalks, giving women more time to cross at crosswalks, designing housing without stairs, and improving public transportation and exercise options.

Consider these statistics:

• There are 118.5 million women in the nation’s central cities and their suburbs, more than half the urban population.
• About 17 million women in those areas are age 65 and older — almost 60% of the total number of seniors in cities.
• Women 65 and older are three times as likely as their male counterparts to live alone.
• More than 14 million women live alone in cities.
• More than 23 million women are heads of households.
• More than 60% of those who care for an older person are women.

All hail Philadelphia for seeing a need and working to strengthen its brand with female citizens.  Let’s hope other cities around the country follow suit.