Audible traffic signals to help disabled

Marilyn Tucci and her guide dog, Anna, were walking to a meeting in Smithtown when they stopped at an intersection on Main Street.

The Shirley woman, blind since birth, could not see traffic signals that would tell her when it was OK to cross the street. When she thought the coast was clear, she motioned to Anna to move forward. But the Labrador-golden retriever mix would not budge. So Tucci and her canine companion waited, listening as cars whizzed by.

"I stood on this corner, no exaggeration, for 20 minutes," Tucci said of the day in December 2010. "Every time I thought it would be safe to cross . . . the dog would refuse."

Crossing Main Street became less difficult this year with the addition of devices known as audible pedestrian signals. The machines, also called audible crosswalks, are used at an increasing number of Long Island intersections.

New models, such as the ones installed in Smithtown, have an electronically generated voice that tells pedestrians when it is safe to cross a road and counts down the seconds before a traffic signal changes. Earlier versions, many still in use, beep but do not talk.

Guide dogs are taught to not cross a street if they sense it isn't safe. But dogs aren't perfect, and the audible signals are "just one more thing to make it a little more safer," said Anne Mercer of the Guide Dog Foundation in Smithtown.

The state Department of Transportation has installed the devices, which cost about $1,500 each, at 32 intersections in Nassau and Suffolk since 2004, said Eileen Peters, a DOT spokeswoman. Suffolk has put them on seven county roads, and Nassau has nine audible signals on county roads, county spokeswomen said.

An audible signal is to be installed by fall at Montauk Highway and William Floyd Parkway in Shirley, near Tucci's home. "It's going to mean that maybe I can cross the street safely," said Tucci, 60, an independent-living specialist for the Suffolk Independent Living Organization in Ronkonkoma, which works with the disabled.

The Shirley signal was requested on Tucci's behalf by Patrick Mitchell, commander of American Veterans Sons Post 48 in Blue Point. The retired special education teacher said he has successfully lobbied state and Suffolk officials to place more than a dozen of the devices on local roads.

"Who knows?" Mitchell said. "Maybe they'll be helping me someday."

In addition to the blind, audible crosswalks help seniors and others whose infirmities make crossing the street challenging. Suffolk County Legis. Lynne Nowick (R-St. James) said they help nonhandicapped pedestrians, too. "This device," she said, "is like having your mother standing next to you, telling you how many seconds you have left."

By the numbers

48

Intersections with audible signals

19

Intersections in Nassau

29

Intersections in Suffolk

$1,500

Cost per signal

Where they are

Audible pedestrian signals are at the following locations:

Babylon: Deer Park Avenue at Fire Island Avenue

Bellrose:Jericho Turnpike at 249th Street and Penn Avenue

Bohemia:Veterans Memorial Highway at Sycamore Avenue

Carle Place: Old County Road and No. 1 Old Country Road

Coram: Port Jefferson-Patchogue Road at Skips Road; Port Jefferson-Patchogue Road at Wedgewood Drive

East Commack: Jericho Turnpike at Beechwood Lane, Commack shopping center; Jericho Turnpike at Kings Park Road

Farmingdale: Fulton Street at Staples Street

Garden City: Merillon Avenue and Oxford Boulevard; Merillon Avenue and Nassau Boulevard

Glen Cove: Glen Street and Glen Cove Senior Center

Hewlett: Broadway and Franklin Avenue

Hicksville: Newbridge Road and LIRR station; Newbridge Road at Fordham Road and Elmira Street; Newbridge Road at Stewart Avenue and School Drive; Broadway at Herzog Place/LIRR station

Huntington: Main Street at New York Avenue (Route 110)

Islip: Montauk Highway at Union Avenue; Montauk Highway at Monell Avenue; Montauk Highway at Grant Avenue

Kings Park: Main Street at Old Dock Road/Pulaski Road/East Northport Road

Levittown: Newbridge Road at Levittown Parkway and Flamingo Road

Lindenhurst: Montauk Highway at South Broadway

Mineola: Old Country Road, West Street and Third Avenue

Oyster Bay: South Street at Audrey Avenue and East Main Street; South Street at West Main Street

Port Washington: Shore Road and Delco Plaza; Port Washington Boulevard at Eastern Crest

Selden: Middle Country Road at North Ocean Avenue (County Road 83)

Smithtown: Jericho Turnpike at Ledgewood Drive; State Route 25 at state routes 111 and 25A; Main Street at Maple Avenue; Main Street at Landing Avenue and Miller Place; Main Street at Redwood Lane and New York Avenue; Middle Country Road at Terry Road

South Farmingdale: Main Street, Marion Street and Fallwood Parkway; Main Street, Midwood Avenue and Staples Street

Terryville: Port Jefferson-Patchogue Road at Washington Avenue

West Babylon: Babylon-Farmingdale Road at Great East Neck Road and Little Neck