Hey, Clover Moore!

Let’s just forget the ridiculous controversy and supposed distraction of our rainbow crossing on Oxford Street. We’ve changed our minds. We now want a bunch of these fucking amazing same-sex traffic lights! Not only would they make perfect sense in terms of safety (the sheer novelty factor would ensure more eyes than ever were focused on the lights turning from red to green) but they would offer some much-needed reprieve from the onslaught of disappointment that come with being a member of the LGBTQI community in Sydney; the city that never wakes up.

So, yeah. Umm. Please?

Originally introduced to the Austrian city of Vienna during the Eurovision Song Contest held last May, the super-sweet traffic lights featuring silhouetted same-sex couples holding hands were so popular that they were also installed in neighbouring cities Linz and Salzburg.

However, in a move similar to Sydney’s senseless revoking of joy, hope and colour in 2014, traffic official Markus Hein, member of the ironically named right-wing Freedom Party, had them removed late last year – branding them a “misuse” of public money.

“Traffic lights are for traffic, and should not be misused to impart advice on how to live your life,” said the first-rate party pooper.

I mean, surely it would cost more money to remove them than to simply let them be? But this isn’t really about money, is it? IS IT?!

Thankfully the Linz city council has recently come to its senses and voted to overrule The Freedom Party’s lame decision, paving the way for the lights to be reinstalled once more.

Hallelujah!

Stefan Thuma, a spokesman for Austrian LGBT group HOSI, told The Local that he welcomed the decision to reinstall the lights, adding that the Freedom Party’s move to scrap them in the first place had been an “embarrassing spectacle” resulting in unwanted “international attention”.

Meanwhile, down in Australia, the hopes of a nation rest on the sturdy shoulders of one woman…