A Blind Person is Crossing the Street

A blind person is crossing the street. You see them waiting, white cane in hand. Should you tell them it’s safe to cross? They can’t see the light change, is it your moral duty as a fellow human to give them this information? They step out into the street and you watch from your car, hands a little tense on the wheel. Finally, you can’t hold it in anymore. “Left,” you shout. “Left, left,” you are doing the right thing, you know you are.

But they don’t thank you. They twist their body a little towards you and stop you with a raised hand. “I’m good, I’m good.” Why didn’t they thank you? Why were they so ungrateful, not appreciating the information you, someone who could see, was giving them?

I regularly have encounters like this. Drivers fear that I will wander off into oncoming traffic or hit their cars with my cane. They are concerned that if I’m standing at a crossing I might not know when to cross, perhaps, without their input I’d be there forever. None of these scenarios are likely to happen, but the average sighted person who has been exposed to few if any blind people in their lifetime has no way of knowing this. They think how they would cross the street if they were blind and the fear of the unknown overwhelms them.

I can understand that fear. You don’t know what you don’t know, and if a person has no knowledge of the techniques blind people like myself use to live our lives successfully it’s understandable that they might assume that blindness is difficult, scary or even impossible.

Stepping in and shouting out information in this way is absolutely the worst thing a person can do. When I cross the street I use the information around me to determine when I’m going to cross and to stay lined up correctly when crossing. Audible information tells me a huge amount about the intersection I have arrived at. How many lanes of traffic can I hear? Are they all heading the same way, indicating a one-way street. Am I at a t intersection? How is the traffic controlled, does it sound like one or both streets are controlled by a stop sign, or is a light controlling the traffic? If there’s a light, how long is each street given? Knowing this information tells me if I need to hit the button to give myself more time, or if the light as it is will give me enough time to get across the street.

I also use the sound of moving traffic to line myself up. This will prevent me from crossing diagonally or veering too much into either the idling or moving parallel traffic. I also use the position of the sun on my body. When I do step out into the street to cross I’m aware of where the sun is on my body. By keeping it in the same place I can use it to stay straight when walking across, this is particularly helpful when there is minimal parallel traffic to rely on.

Sight doesn’t prevent car accidents. The vast majority of accidents on the road do not involve a blind person, so when someone yells out of their window at me to tell me I can cross, or that I’m doing the crossing wrong their shouts are a distraction rather than the helpful input they believe it is. I trust in my own skills and the techniques I’ve learnt as a blind person to get myself around safely. Whilst the person in the car has good intentions their behaviour puts me at risk more than it helps me. I’m having to either try and block out their yells or tell them to stop. I may miss valuable information, or lose my focus because of it.

If you have been that person please don’t beat yourself up. But do remember not to think how you would cross the street if you suddenly went blind. Ask yourself how you might do it after spending your whole life as a blind person, with the knowledge that you may not know enough about blindness to have all the answers. And ask yourself how I got to that intersection. I didn’t suddenly spring into being, waiting at the corner to cross. I had to leave my home, possibly board a bus or train, navigate the streets and countless other crossings without my vision. I got to this intersection in one piece, chances are I’ll make it safely on my own.