[Blindtlk] Walking on city streets with no sidewalks

[Lloyd Rasmussen]

I'm not in your shoes. If this is a fairly stable neighborhood, more and 
more people will become used to your perigrenations, and more and more will 
know when to leave you alone and when you really need help. Some people will 
never "get it", but many will.
Where I work, the NLS building on Taylor Street Northwest, in Washington, 
DC, there are lots of people coming and going. Some of them are not 
well-educated or are from foreign countries. They have not seen blind people 
out and about, trying their best to stay on rough sidewalks with obstacles 
such as welfare lines, people standing around smoking, listening for traffic 
and waiting for the light to change, etc. Therefore, very often someone 
shouts at me to go right or left, and sometimes they have their directions 
mixed up.
We didn't sign up for this, but we all have to bear "the blind person's 
burden" and try to educate the public. In his recent interview with the BBC, 
and maybe also in his NFB convention speech, Tom Bickford noted that 
conditions have improved for blind people over his 58 years in the NFB 
because we are getting out there into the world. If we all rode paratransit 
or sat in our self-driving cars, less people would learn what blind people 
can do.

Lloyd Rasmussen, Kensington, MD
http://lras.home.sprynet.com
-----Original Message----- 
From: Arielle Silverman via blindtlk
Sent: Saturday, September 26, 2015 7:09 PM
To: blindtlk at nfbnet.org
Cc: Arielle Silverman
Subject: [Blindtlk] Walking on city streets with no sidewalks

Hi all. Just wanted to pick your brains regarding tips for traveling
effectively and staying oriented on streets that have no or
inconsistent sidewalks. There are some streets in my city that have no
sidewalk and are fairly quiet streets but they intersect a busy
street. When I attended LCB I got some good practice shorelining
gutters on the edge of the road or seams between the road and
driveways. But here there are often seams that come and go, or
intermittent gravel patches, or rows of parked cars that come and go,
making it difficult for me to stay centered. Sometimes the parked cars
also make echolocation difficult. How do you stay straight?
Another related aggravation is that often do-gooders will freak out if
I am walking in the street even though it's my only option given the
lack of sidewalk. Especially if I veer a tiny bit away from the edge
because of the lack of consistent landmarks, people will get really
concerned and keep asking me if I need help or if I need a ride or
admonishing me not to be in the street like I'm an errant
three-year-old. Even when I know my way, it makes me feel
uncomfortable about walking in the street because I feel like I'm
bringing all this attention on me and distracting and upsetting others
around me. How do you handle such reactions? These are quiet streets,
so I don't believe I am actually in danger (and if I hear a car coming
I always get as far to the side as I can), but because it's hard for
me to keep a straight line, sighted people don't know how to deal with
me. What are your thoughts about this?
One example: A bus stop I sometimes use is on a tiny patch of sidewalk
with grass on one side and a fenced driveway on the other. When I
cross the street to get to the stop, it's easy for me to miss the
small sidewalk patch and I have to walk up and down the block a little
bit (without sidewalk) to find it. I can usually find it fairly
quickly, but one time as I was looking for the stop, several people
stopped their cars or got out of their cars trying to help me find the
stop (and some not even knowing there was a bus stop there) just
making everything a big mess. I ended up switching to a further-away
bus stop on sidewalk to avoid that problem, but I have to walk through
a sidewalk-less block to get there.
So, how do you stay oriented, and how do you placate the do-gooders
and keep them from becoming a distraction?

Best,
Arielle