Daniel Tonge

October 21, 2002

I am a totally blind person, 51 years old. I have been an independent traveler for 22 years, and intersection signals have changed tremendously over my traveling years. One of the basic tenants of blind gravel is listening for the traffic, in order to know when it is safe to cross the street. Of course, this relies upon the premise that motorists are obeying the signals. There are a growing number of intersections which allow turning traffic at the same time pedestrians can walk. This makes it practically impossible to determine the status of the signal by simply listening to the traffic. Accessible pedestrian signals (not on every corner) are necessary to allow us as blind people to have direct input (as do sighted persons). We also need to know if and where there are push buttons to control the walk signal. The buttons are not uniformly located a certain distance from the crosswalk, so those intersections need to have beeps or some other method to allow us to know that there is a button and to know where it is.

Thank you for taking the time to read this note. Please vote to approve the recommends in the PROWAC Report.

Dan