How does the blind man who gets on my bus know where to get off?

Question

I don't see him any more but a couple of years ago a blind man always used to catch the same bus as me when I was going home from work. The journey was a fairly long one (about half an hour with *lots* of stops and turns) and he always got off at the same stop in the same street. Can anyone tell me how a blind person would know which is their stop to get off without anyone telling them? He never asked the driver where we were. I know there are varying degrees of blindness but I don't think he could see anything at all because he had a cane and I once saw him walk into an information board erected on the pavement. However he did it, it was really clever. It's amazing how people with disabilities find ways to do as much as they can in the face of adversity.

Answer 1

yeah like the other person said, I guess he just knows the way. I suppose he would feel which way the bus is turning and be able to tell where he is

Answer 2

Sounds wierd but there was this guy that told me the blind feel the turns in the road as the bus moves and have a much better understanding of where they are then we'd think.

Can't see it being anything else because buses don't always stop at everystop do they.

Answer 3

Yep, counting the amount of stops and I'm sure that he knows when you take that turn it'll be about this many minutes until the next stop, etc.

Answer 4

I'm guessing he listened to how many times the door opened and he knew from the time he got on until the time he got off how many stops the bus was scheduled to make.

Answer 5

Question:  But, does a bus ALWAYS stop at ALL the stops!

Can't answer you question itself, but I used to travel on the Northern Line to Edgware (London Underground), and regularly there were pigeons who got on the train and rode a couple of stops and then hopped off onto the platform.

No way of knowing if they were the same birds though !!

Sash.