Dori: Rainbow crosswalks of Capitol Hill declared unsafe by feds
Oct 8, 2019, 3:25 PM
Former Seattle Mayor Ed Murray celebrates pride in 2015 with rainbow-painted crosswalks on Capitol Hill. (City of Seattle photo)
(City of Seattle photo)
Remember a few years ago when former Mayor Ed Murray spent $66,000 to paint 11 crosswalks on Capitol Hill and First Hill in rainbow colors?
At that point, I asked if all the colors in the rainbow offered the same contrast as white on pavement. What if someone were to be injured or killed due to these crosswalks, because a driver didn’t see the rainbow crosswalk as well as a reflective white crosswalk?
People told me I was looking for trouble where it didn’t exist.
Now, however, I am vindicated — the Federal Highway Administration and the U.S. Department of Transportation have declared the rainbow crosswalks to be statistically more unsafe than the normal white ones.
Dori: Ed Murray continues his unnecessary expenditures with rainbow-colored crosswalks
It was just a big waste of money, making something that is utilitarian and supposed to be about safety into a social justice symbol. Everything that we do around here is to feel good and virtue-signal, even if it makes things more dangerous. We don’t do things to do well for humans.
The Seattle Department of Transportation of course maintains that the crosswalks’ safety is phenomenal. But the feds have told them that if they want federal funding at an intersection with a rainbow crosswalk, they’ll have to change it to a standard white crosswalk.
That was $66,00 well spent.
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