Jane Lansaw N.O.M.C.
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October 28, 2002 |
Dear Transportation Board Members,
I am a blind person and a certified orientation and mobility instructor. I not
only teach the alternative techniques of blindness, I use them as a normal part
of my everyday life. As a blind person and as a rehabilitation professional, I
am deeply concerned about the environmental changes being proposed by your
board. By and large, most of these changes are simply unnecessary and I would
tend to ignore their existence as I would ignore the white lines on a crosswalk.
when I can see them at all, which isn't often, I have already ascertained the
information they offer. Like the lines on a crosswalk, truncated domes and
audible traffic signals are unnecessary because there are so many other cues in
the environment that tell me where and when to cross a street. Unlike the lines
on a crosswalk, which are perfectly serviceable alternative techniques for the
sighted, truncated domes and audible traffic signals are freighted with
difficulty for the very people they are intended to assist. These are not only
issues of safety but of a broader social view.
First I will address truncated domes. It is logical to think that a pedestrian
might need to know where the cross walk is located on an intersection. sighted
people have painted lines on the street for just such a purpose but the absence
of these lines doesn't impede a sighted person's ability to cross safely.
Likewise, even though I can rarely see crosswalk lines, I know where they should
be. I listen to the sound of cars, the echo of surrounding buildings and feel
the texture of the pavement under my cane and feet to judge where the sidewalk
stops and the street starts. If a corner is particularly tricky, I e flat,
blended curb, I use my cane to tell concrete from asphalt or other subtle
changes that show the difference. I also use the sound of the vehicles to judge
the distance between myself and traffic and can extrapolate my proximity from
that.
Let me pause to mention a factor which may be confusing to you. I have mentioned
my occasional ability to see things. This partial vision is a convenience when
window shopping but was often a danger to me before I used sleep shades to
obtain my personal blindness skills. I also used these shades when training as a
cane travel instructor and consider them a valuable teaching tool with my
students. therefore, it is not my very limited vision which makes me a safe
traveler, it is my ability to ignore such vision in favor of more accurate
information that makes me safe. This is true for most blind people with some
vision.
Back to the crosswalk though. Such painted lines may or may not be of any use to
the sighted for whom they are designed but their presence holds no physical
danger for those who trod upon them. Truncated domes however can pose a hazard,
not especially to the blind but to anyone with a walking impediment and walking
aids like support canes and crutches. People without a walking impediment can
also be in danger during bad weather. Ice, rain and snow can make regular
footing treacherous for the average pedestrian. Ordinary surfaces are bad enough
when wet and slick. Add the uneven surface of truncated domes and no one is
safe. Some intrepid members of my gender walk about perched precariously on
spiked heels. Whenever I encounter truncated domes, I give thanks that I have
never been a woman who wears heels. This combination frightens me more than any
type of traffic. If safety is your motivation for installing these devices,
consult the blind for whom they are intended. Consult those who are out on the
street, using the alternative techniques of blindness as a matter of course.
Some food for thought, if a crossing is truly unsafe for the blind, is it really
any safer for the sighted pedestrian? Are there some streets that you should not
be crossing too?
I want to pause briefly to mention subway platforms. A great deal has been said
by some blind people about the dangers of subway platforms which do not have
truncated domes around the edge. If you use a white cane, you will notice the
sudden drop two or three steps before your foot comes near the edge. If you use
a dog guide, the animal is trained to alert to such things as steps, curbs or
sudden drop offs. My O. & M. class took a tour of The Seeing Eye and they
explained all of this to us on a train platform high above the ground in
Morristown N.J. If you do not use a cane or dog, one would presume that your
eyes are reliable enough to make these tools unnecessary. Presumably too, you
have entered a train or subway platform area deliberately and have reason to
expect such an edge. It is difficult for anyone, no matter how cognitively
impaired, to wander into such places unaware. People who fall from such
platforms do so for reasons other than visual acuity. Intoxication, suicide,
even daydreaming can cause this tragedy but not blindness. Some would say that
if a blind person falls to the tracks, it is because of blindness and our tools,
cane or dog, were insufficient to protect us. If a sighted person falls, no one
ever says that eyesight is an insufficient tool. However if you did a
statistical survey, I would wager that the percentages of sighted to blind falls
are about equal. There are far more sighted people falling each year than blind.
Not that we are safer, only that there are more of you. I would wager that the
survey would show that the odds are even. Blind people have the skills to avoid
this calamity. If we didn’t, we wouldn’t have the skills to reach the station in
the first place. Those blind people who believe truncated domes are necessary
may be suffering from the beliefs about blindness that much of society holds.
More about this as we get into social views.
What of audible traffic signals? Why are they so controversial? These devices
too are usually unnecessary and can also be unsafe. They are unnecessary because
there are ways of listening to traffic to determine when it is safe to cross.
those blind people with hearing impairments who cannot make use of my methods
would be equally unable to make use of those your board is proposing. They are
unsafe for two reasons. First, the sound of the signal may mask a particularly
quiet vehicle which is about to turn toward me or run a red light. Sighted
people make use of "walk" and "don't walk" signs all the time. This doesn't mean
that you do not also watch out for vehicles in turn lanes or drivers who are
reckless. You have the common sense to pay attention to your environment even
when the light is green and the sign says you may walk. So do the blind but if
you mask the important sounds with what is in essence a "walk don't walk" sign,
you are making it more dangerous for us than it was before you ever came along.
Since your motivation is only to be helpful, I recommend a vibro/tactile signal
for the deaf blind. This would be actuated only by people who need and want
them, it would not make it more dangerous for the rest of us and would be more
appropriate as it would actually help the one population who needs it the most,
the deaf/blind. Blind people in general might find your suggestions more helpful
if you limited your signals to round abouts and extremely geometrically complex,
multi-street intersections. Even so, consulting blind organizations in a given
area before making plans is generally a considerate thing to do as it is the
lives of these people who will be impacted by such major environmental
constructs.
I mentioned a broader social view above. This is about how the blind are treated
in society. To understand how society sees us, we look at how other minorities
have fared in our world. As you know, segregation meant much more than a white
person not wanting to drink after or go to school with a black person. By having
special facilities for minorities, society could require the group to use those
facilities instead of the regular facilities. Dr. Marc Maurer, president of the
National Federation Of the Blind, recently informed the members of this
organization, that he had learned something disturbing in Japan. Blind people in
that country may be experiencing a very real segregation not unlike the southern
drinking fountains of our own history. Where there are special signals for the
blind, they are encouraged to use them exclusively, even when it may be
perfectly safe and more convenient to use the paths taken by everyone else.
Doubtless, you are saying that such extremes could never happen in America. We
learned our lesson about segregation. The 14th Amendment scholar, Jacobus
tenBroek once said that if tyrany comes to America, it will come in the form of
services. Surely you have observed that 21st century America is a very service
oriented society.
Whether it will or won’t come to full segregation, such services as truncated
domes and audible traffic signals can adversely affect the attitudes of society
toward the blind. This in turn will shape the attitudes of the blind about
themselves. If we allow modifications to the environment which are unnecessary,
we are encouraging society to restrict us even more than it tries to do at
present. If everyone thinks we need all these special constructs to move safely
in the world, they will never be able to look at us as possible employees,
coworkers or first class citizens at all. If we need bells and whistles to get
around, if taxpayers must foot the bill to take us by the hand and keep us safe,
how can they take us seriously as their equals and responsible partners in
society? They cannot. Society has relatively low expectations regarding the
abilities of the blind compared with other disabled minorities. Still,
expectations are higher today than they were a hundred years ago. The future has
the potential of offering still higher expectations until the day when society
in general learns to expect the blind to pull their weight just like everyone
else. If we allow well intentioned groups and boards to provide us with services
we don’t need, we are inviting you to lower your expectations even further. We
are inviting further restriction, segregation and a return to the alms house and
the rocking chair. As we teach you to believe we are less capable than we are,
you will teach us in turn to believe we are less capable. This vicious circle of
lowered expectation is why some of our blind brethren believe they need special
bells and whistles to get about safely. If we allow their expectations for their
own abilities to sink further, who knows. Maybe next they will want a special
Wal Mart for the blind because the regular one is too big and dangerous to
navigate.
We have been discussing the views on blindness of both the sighted and the
blind. What really breaks my heart as a rehabilitation professional is the
difficulty sighted people have when they lose vision. Giving up the car keys,
discussing alternative techniques and making the decision to step out in public
with a white cane are all much more soul searching decisions than they need to
be. Clients have cried in my arms because they are now faced with a state of
being which is completely normal and natural for me. Going blind is hard for
sighted people because they are taught that it is a tragedy and they are less of
a person. It takes a lot of work and patience to build them back up to normal
and it needn’t be that way. If we insist that people see blindness for what it
is, a characteristic requiring some alternative methods to do what others do
with sight, perhaps people will one day go blind with the grace and dignity of
turning Seventy. You can help this happen. By talking and listening to the
blind, finding out what blindness is and what it isn’t, you can make it easier
for my future clients to come into blindness without all the trauma of the
current generation. You have chosen this notion of modifying the environment
because you want to make sure we can get where we are going safely. As people
who make decisions regarding transportation, you would do us a far greater
service by assisting with the perpetuation of public transportation so that the
blind and all pedestrians can have access to the world as it is.
Sincerely
Jane Lansaw N.O.M.C.