Summer 2007

Dan Staub, Machine Set-Up

One of the key training areas our Orientation and Mobility (O & M) Program covers is Metro bus travel for blind and Deaf-Blind adults. This training gives individuals with visual disabilities access to the cornerstones of our mission -- independence and self-sufficiency.

Our current contract with Metro Transit includes training for residents of King County who use the bus as their primary means of travel and who also have disabilities. Training includes bus travel training and equipment training. O & M Instructors work with blind and Deaf-Blind clients on learning bus routes, planning trips, and using mobility skills and tools to travel safely and independently. For example, instructors teach blind individuals to use bus kits with special cards that alert Metro drivers that the rider is blind or Deaf-Blind.

Recently, Machine Set-up Dan Staub, who is totally blind due to an accident, sat down with us to talk more about what this training has meant to him. Dan moved to Issaquah from Kirkland two years ago, and needed to learn all new routes and mobility options. Here, in his own words, is Dan’s perspective on the difference O & M training has made in his life.

“I’ve come up with an analogy for what Metro training means for blind people: It’s like me coming to you when you have a busted fan-belt in your car and telling you to fix it. The only way you would be able to do it is if you had somebody who trains you or works with you to change that fan-belt.

Metro Transit is the same thing to us. It’s there, but without the proper training or people working with us it might as well be that car with busted fan-belt and you just standing there looking at it. With Metro, we’re able to go places and do things as long as we have had the mobility and training to use Metro.

I’ve been living in Issaquah for two years this July and I’ve been able to get down to the Highlands Park & Ride and come into work, take the bus home, and get around my own neighborhood. As far as Issaquah goes, it could have been an island 3,000 miles away before the training because I didn’t have any way to use the facilities down there. I didn’t know how to get to the buses, which bus to take, or where things were.

The Metro grant has opened all that up to me. Working with [O & M Instructor] David Miller with the mobility on the buses has really helped me out as far as independence goes, and I am able to help my wife out with grocery shopping and running errands. I’m able to take the buses from work to Issaquah and do my shopping. I’m able to get to the bank and do my banking by myself. Before, I had to rely on friends to take me down there.

It’s just opened up my whole life again. The Lighthouse and Metro have opened up that door where I am able to go out and do the things I need to do.”

If you would like to learn more about supporting Orientation and Mobility opportunities for blind and Deaf-Blind adults, please contact Annual Fund Manager Jennifer Moore – Phone: (206) 436-2253 – Email: jmoore@seattlelh.org.

Previous Page | Horizons Main Page | Home