£50k ‘inclusive rainbow crossing’ excludes visually impaired

Another pro-LGBT ‘painted junction’ costing taxpayers nearly £50,000 is confusing visually impaired people, a UK charity has said.

The National Federation of the Blind of the UK (NFBUK) has criticised Hounslow Council for funding a rainbow crossing in the name of “inclusion” without considering its impact on the partially sighted.

According to The Daily Telegraph, the crossing in Chiswick High Road – which cost £48,174 to install – is the most expensive rainbow crossing in England.

Inclusion trumps safety

Sarah Gayton, the NFBUK’s shared space co-ordinator, complained: “We’ve got a man in his 80s who has a visual impairment and uses a walking stick – he says that all these different colours really confuse him when he’s walking on the road.

“People are being left confused and distracted when crossing the street, but these councils think they know best and just ignore these widely-expressed concerns.”

She added: “That money could be spent on much-needed safety and accessibility for blind and visually impaired people”.

Risk

Last year, it emerged that NHS trusts had spent over £45,000 on installing and maintaining pedestrian crossings with the colours of the LGBT flag between 2020 and 2021.

The Salisbury NHS Foundation Trust had spent the most, paying out £11,000 on four rainbow crossings.

In 2021, disability campaign group Access Association warned that a multi-coloured crossing “poses risks to disabled people” and called on the Department for Transport to ban them from deviating from the traditional black and white stripes.

Vanity project

Earlier this month, the Princess Royal University Hospital in Farnborough – part of King’s College Hospital NHS Foundation Trust – was accused of wasting funds on a pro-LGBT ‘vanity project’.

A source close to Health Secretary Steve Barclay described the London hospital’s mural of the “Intersex-Inclusive Pride flag” as “virtue signalling”.