Carolyn J. Brock
|
October 2, 2002 |
Dear Access Board members,
I urge you NOT to mandate the use of audible traffic signals and truncated
domes. These devices serve no purpose for blind pedestrians in most situations,
and their use should be implemented only when the necessary information cannot
be obtained by other means. Most importantly, the cost of implementing such a
mandate would be an outrageous waste of the taxpayers' money.
I moved here to Portland, Oregon just over a year ago. From Missoula, Montana.
My experience with audible traffic signals had been on visits to other cities. I
found the signals confusing and distracting; many were so noisy as to make it
impossible to hear the traffic sounds well enough to cross the street safely
while the signal was sounding. When I encountered the truncated domes, I had no
idea what they were other than just one more obstacle cluttering up the
sidewalks.
A couple of years ago one audible traffic signal was installed in Missoula, near
the rehabilitation agency for the blind. It was at a busy intersection which my
blind colleagues and I had never found difficult to navigate. We invited the
city street department to send a representative to a meeting of the Montana
Association for the Blind. When we explained that the noisy signal was of no
help to us and was actually a dangerous distraction, the city engineer surprised
us by saying that he understood exactly what we meant. He then told us the story
of a town where the highway passed through the center of town but where there
had never been painted crosswalks. The town installed the crosswalks at several
intersections and put up crosswalk signs. They were shocked to find that in the
first year there were MORE pedestrian accidents at these intersections than
there had been before the crosswalks were painted. The reason was obvious:
people felt a false sense of security in the crosswalks.
No one actually believes that a painted line on the pavement provides any real
protection against tons of moving metal; the same can be said for audible
traffic signals. But I am reminded of this story every time I hear a blind
person with poor mobility skills say, "Oh, I feel so much safer when there is an
audible signal." If September 11 has taught us one lesson, it should be this:
just FEELING safe is of no value whatsoever!
When I arrived in Portland, I was appalled to find audible traffic signals all
over the city, especially at intersections which are very busy and therefore
easy to cross just by listening to the traffic. Most offensive was the
intersection of S.E. 122nd Avenue and Division, where I have to change busses
when I go to visit my mother. It is a very busy intersection, with heavy traffic
in all four directions and a most predictable traffic pattern. But just as the
light changed in my favor, the signal would emit a piercing "Screeeeeee,"
drowning out the sound of the traffic and making it especially hard to detect
cars preparing to make a right turn on red--the most dangerous factor at such an
intersection. My only option was to stay on the curb until the screeching
stopped, thereby losing valuable crossing time. Recently lights at this
intersection have been re-programmed and the traffic pattern changed. In
addition, the audible signal has been turned down so low that it is almost
impossible to hear at all. While that makes the crossing much safer for a blind
pedestrian, it is still a waste of the city's money!
I discovered the most ridiculous example of an audible signal this past summer
when I was leaving on a trip by plane early in the morning. Rather than drive me
all the way to the airport, my husband took me to the Lloyd Center, not far from
our house, to catch the first MAX (Portland's light rail train) of the morning
at 4:15 a.m. At that hour there was no one around except two other people
waiting for the train. There certainly were not crowds of pedestrians, blind or
sighted, heading for the shopping mall. But at the corner the audible traffic
signal blared out, "Cuckoo, cuckoo!" The signal seemed less of a warning about
the traffic than about the mental state of the poor people who live in the
nearby apartments and have to listen to that awful sound 24-7!
Ironically, I have encountered a couple of intersections in the Portland area
where an audible signal would be helpful. The most notable is in Vancouver, near
the Fisher's Landing transit center where I take the bus to visit my two
daughters. It is a pedestrian crossing across a busy road leading to a freeway
ramp, and there is no cross traffic. I have seen other such intersections in
Portland, and none of them have audible signals. The traffic engineers are using
a very strange set of criteria in judging which intersections need audible
signals and which ones do not!
Most disturbing is the publicity campaign launched by the companies which stand
to make a great deal of money if these mandates are implemented. They sponsor
tables at conventions of blind people and have convinced many rehabilitation
professionals to advocate for them. Especially vulnerable to this pressure are
newly blind people who do not yet know that they can learn the necessary skills
to travel safely without such expensive devices. We all know that high-pressure
advertising can convince us that we really need to be drinking soda pop instead
of water, popping vitamin pills instead of eating fruits and vegetables, and
playing video games instead of reading books. The same kind of advertising can
convince unskilled blind people that audible traffic signals and truncated domes
will solve their mobility problems.
I am not one of these citizens, so vocal in recent years, who want to cut taxes
in whatever way possible. I am happy to pay my fair share, as I agree with
Oliver Wendell Holmes that, "Taxes are the price we pay for a civilized
society." I would eagerly pay higher taxes to make life better for all of us:
better schools, better law enforcement, better roads, better health care, better
mass transit, better access for all pedestrians. In particular, I would love to
see better mobility training for all blind people so that everyone can travel
confidently and safely. If the tax money were spent for this kind of training,
audible traffic signals and truncated domes would be necessary in only a few
situations. Let's put our efforts where they will do the most good for the most
people.
I urge you to reject the proposed mandates.
Carolyn J. Brock