The city of Gainesville celebrated the opening of its newly renovated City Hall Plaza, which incorporates rainbow bricks salvaged from the downtown crosswalks that were demolished last year after state officials ordered communities to remove them.
Rainbow bricks find new home at renovated Gainesville City Hall Plaza https://t.co/KNcuuaOw7h pic.twitter.com/Tksf7ENEVT
— Gay Travel & Tourism (@gaytourism) May 8, 2026
According to the Gainesville Sun, city officials pulled roughly 1,900 bricks from 3 downtown crosswalks after the Florida Department of Transportation threatened to cut the city’s transportation funding in August 2025. The Transportation Department claimed that non-standard markings “can lead to distractions or misunderstandings, which can jeopardize safety.”
However, a 2022 Asphalt Art Safety Study found traffic safety improvements across 22 asphalt art projects in the U.S., with a 50% drop in crashes involving pedestrians or cyclists and a 27% increase in drivers yielding to pedestrians.
Rainbow Bricks Get A New Life
Instead of discarding the rainbow bricks following the removal of the crosswalks, the city commission chose to honor the LGBTQ community by incorporating them into the new City Hall Plaza.
Several cities across the country are finding ways to restore rainbow representation in their towns. Miami Beach reinstalled its rainbow bricks in an oceanfront park across from the city’s gay beach last month. And the city of Boise responded to a ban on Pride flags in Idaho by wrapping its city hall flagpoles with rainbow stripes.
Thoughts? The rainbow bricks, which once formed a crosswalk to Gainesville City Hall, are being repurposed after the state forced the city to remove them from the roadway 👇https://t.co/OKheOlldKm pic.twitter.com/Ssy38KDx4o
— WCJB TV20 News (@WCJB20) May 1, 2026