The City of Fort Lauderdale is the last standing municipality in the legal fight against the Florida Department of Transportation’s and Gov. DeSantis’s call for the removal of crosswalk art in cities throughout Florida.
In June 2025, the FDOT sent out memorandums that required all pavement markings associated with social, political or ideological messages or images to be removed. This includes rainbow crosswalks in Delray Beach, Miami Beach and Fort Lauderdale.
According to Fort Lauderdale Commissioner Steven Glassman, the city is involved in four different cases that claim that the FDOT violated home rule authority and that multiple of these projects were done in conjunction with the state. The home rule argument asserts that the FDOT’s actions are an overreach of state power.
Local artist and community leader, Robin Haynes Merrill, is the creator of the two Aquifer murals on Breakers Avenue. Both ranked third and fourth nationwide in a Bloomberg Philanthropies study on street art and safety.
She was surprised to hear that her murals were also on the cutting board.
“I worked with all the FDOT’s standards to create these,” Merrills said. “This is not guerilla art, this was part of the state Vision Zero program’s Safe Street program.”
Vision Zero is a campaign and strategy in Florida communities that is aimed to eradicate traffic deaths and injuries while making Florida transportation safer.
The FDOT warned that any city failing to comply with the new policy would face state-mandated removal and be billed for the associated costs.
As promised, despite public protest and the City of Miami Beach’s appeal to preserve the rainbow crosswalk on Ocean Drive, the FDOT proceeded to remove the artwork on Oct. 5.
The outcome of the city of Fort Lauderdale’s lawsuit still remains uncertain but Commissioner Glassman seems hopeful.
“We’re in it to win obviously, and we think we have good cases,” he said. “At the end of the day, I don’t think anyone will be able to say hey you didn’t give it your best shot.”
