Walking While Blind in Manhattan During the Pandemic

Peter Slatin, NFB Braille Monitor, March 2021
Crowded sidewalks and roadways have a few benefits to the blind: motion provides clues to what is happening. Before the pandemic, when I approached a corner I could hear whether other pedestrians were walking in the same direction, stopping, slowing or hurrying. I could hear cars traveling in the same direction and zooming past me on a parallel track through the intersection. I could hear other cars idling perpendicular to me, waiting for a light to change, or driving directly in front of me. These were all signals that it was okay to cross or not. I soon realized that even with loosened rules, the quiet of COVID-19 was magnifying some already difficult situations. But even these aural signals required pausing to listen for anomalous counter indications from vehicles or foot sounds that may have been masked by other sounds, or could occur as a slight shift in energy, vibrations; what Luke Skywalker might call disturbances in the Force.