Day 36: The Wrong Side of the Tracks

Road blocks happen all the time but I have noticed for my Blindman there are literal road blocks that happen from day today, and with a little education to the public some of them could be avoided. These come in various forms from trying to cross the road safely on his own to purely just walking down the street in a straight line. 

In our line of work we often fly interstate and come and go through busy airport terminals. A few months ago I noticed how frustrating it was guiding my husband through to the taxi pick up rank with all of our luggage. I walk ahead and Deano uses his cane tip on the back of my pull along luggage to feel the direction I am moving in. Occasionally I would get ahead and he would loose the feeling of the bag on the end of his cane. This is when walking along the cane tracks makes life a whole lot easier. Dean uses the end of his seeing eye cane to feel the bumps to indicate direction.

Our largest frustration on this occasion was being slowed down by needing to ask people waiting for their ride to move off the cane track. Mostly getting blank stares or looks of confusion as people don't even recognise they are standing on a vital aid for the visually impaired.

"What's a cane track???" I hear you say!

Queen Street Mall Brisbane Cane Tracks

In this post I want to educate sighted people about the most basic thing that I would say the majority of the public would not even recognise as a blind persons aid that helps them in their mobility. The objects I am taking about are found on the ground. Purposely placed on the footpaths throughout a city scape are tiles with raised bumps, sometimes they are made of plastic, concrete, or metal, and these bumps are commonly known as cane tracks or tactile markers

Cane tracks or tactile markers can be found at the bottom and tops of stair wells, close to the edge of the train platform, along walkways and at the entrance of a  shopping centre. They change direction to indicate to the user that something important is ahead or where there is a bus stop or a door opening and even a change in path slope. 

One of the most frustrating moments that happens quite regularly for my Blindman  is when members of the public stand and linger, hovering over a cane track. It can be daunting to a blind person to be forced to leave their directional track and have to manoeuvre around a crowd of people and find the track again. 

So it's my hope that by blogging about this simple concept those that read this post will be more mindful that the bumps in the ground have a useful purpose and are heavily relied on by those who are visually impaired. Please be informed.

Not on the right track

Tactile Paving has meaning for those visually impaired

Can Tracks are commonly found in shopping Centres 

Tactile Paving at a Train station