The recent decision to create a non-Orthodox prayer space at Jerusalem’s Western Wall has been hailed as a historic victory for Jewish feminists; it has also been blasted by those who maintain that a particular flavor of Orthodox women’s prayer will not be properly accommodated by the new plaza.

While Jewish women debate the merits and demerits of their spiritual-fulfillment options near a segment of an ancient Temple Mount retaining wall, other parts of Jerusalem—areas diseased enough to actually require healing prayer and Psalms— escape their notice.

I thought it might be worthwhile to look at one of these other parts of town, in which the Israeli and international media take no interest. It is not a district of obvious religious importance, or one where women have been conspicuously oppressed. Yet I would argue that it, and countless other places like it in Jerusalem and in Israel generally, bear the stigmata of women’s non-participation in urban planning and design.

To put it in terminology from the bad old days of gender essentialism: these parts of Jerusalem are awash in testosterone, and sorely need a woman’s touch.

The area we’re going to tour is Malha, the site of a pedestrian-hostile mall, a fortress-like office park, a 1990s-era stadium, a new budget-busting Arena whose construction was fast-tracked by the current municipal leadership, and a welter of high-speed, multi-lane roads — including a recently-dedicated southern extension of the Menachem Begin Expressway that slices through Jerusalem.

Suppose you’re a woman living in the Katamonim slum that abuts Malha, and you want to run some errands at the mall (which is the only shopping hub anywhere near your home). How do you get there? If you want to go on foot — a reasonable desire, since it’s technically only a few minutes’ walk away — you have to make use of pedestrian bridges or overpasses that carry you over forbidding roadways.