Urban Planning for Health Equity Must Employ an Intersectionality Framework

Abstract

Urban planning for health equity should be guided by an intersectional approach. Intersectionality is an essential framework for understanding the multiple overlapping factors, such as social and economic inequalities, that produce health disparities. We offer four strategies that planning researchers and practitioners can use to develop and integrate an intersectional approach into planning for health equity: challenging implicit and explicit assumptions, building cross-sectoral coalitions united by a shared vision for social and environmental justice, applying transdisciplinary and co-designing approaches throughout the planning process, and using existing tools to evaluate the impact of programs and policies on advancing health equity.