Philadelphia’s Gayborhood Gets Significant Upgrade, But I Have Two Major Complaints

Philadelphia's Gayborhood is the neighborhood that I spend the MOST time in. I cannot begin to estimate the amount of time I've spent in this neighborhood since I moved to town back in 2017.

Yet, when I first got to Philly in 2017 one of the biggest questions I had was about the rainbow crosswalk at 13th and Locust.

The city painted a rainbow on all four sides of that busy intersection in the heart of the crosswalk several years ago. But for the past 5 years (at least) it was barely there.

Visibility matters, but yet our rainbow was a former outline of its once vibrant self. Look at how faded this looks in this image from Google Maps in November 2020. It just looks plain sad, right?

It makes sense after all. Right? THOUSANDS of cars drive through the intersection and without proper upkeep it was bound to happen.

So for years, we've wondered: why hasn't it been repainted? I had heard (through the grapevine) that it was too expensive for the city to do. I get it.

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But rumors also swirled that the city wasn't going to accept private donations from donors who may be willing to pay for the painting job.

So yesterday was a VERY welcome surprise when we saw that painters were spotted at the busy intersection painting the rainbow on the road.

In fact, I CAN NOT wait to see it this weekend with my own eyes. It looks beautiful. Thank you, Philadelphia!

But now... I actually have TWO complaints about Philadelphia's Gayborhood crosswalk.

For starters, the City Of Philadelphia was one of the first to adopt the "updated" pride flag to include the brown, black, and pink stripes to represent persons of color and the trans community. I wish they had incorporated those colors into this week's creation.

And, I have more bad news. I have already seen other pictures surfacing with tire marks on the paint in the intersection.

So I reached out to the city to find out if they had used any special type of paint, but if it already has tire marks, I am worried that it won't be long until it looks tough again.

Right? If it only took 12 hours for the paint to become faded, I can't imagine how bad it will look next month or next year.

This is why we can't have nice things, Philly. I hope it improves a little bit from here.