Self-Study Guide:
Crossing at Modern Traffic Signals
Welcome! We're constructing a Self-Study Guide about teaching visually impaired students to cross at modern intersections with traffic signals.
Strategies that blind people traditionally use are not safe and effective at modern traffic signals because of features such as actuation and complex traffic patterns.
Research by Barlow, Bentzen, & Bond (2005) showed that when blind pedestrians used traditional strategies at complex and/or actuated intersections, sometimes
they began crossing when traffic had the right-of-way across their crosswalk, and
they did not have enough time to complete their crossing before the signal changed because they had not pushed the pedestrian button.
Therefore in July, 2006, the AER O&M Division approved a position paper which states that
O&M specialists will provide consumers with information about how actuated and/or complex traffic signals function and techniques for dealing with them.
This Self-Study Guide is being designed to help you understand what you need to know in order to teach these crossings. ACVREP credit will be available for this material when it is completed.
We are still working on it -- if you want to be informed when it is ready, or if you would like to help develop or field-test the material, contact Dona Sauerburger at dona@sauerburger.org.
Explains that best practice has changed for teaching crossings at traffic signals, and implications of not using best practice Spring 2007 Newsletter, AER Orientation and Mobility Division
Barlow, J.M., Bentzen, B.L. and Bond, T. (2005) Blind pedestrians and the changing technology and geometry of signalized intersections: Safety, orientation and independence. Journal of Visual Impairment and Blindness. Vol 99, (10),587-598.
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