511 – Adventures in Voice Recognition

The San Francisco Bay Area, like many U.S. metropolitan areas, offers traffic information for travelers via telephone, using voice recognition technology. It's pretty cool stuff: you call 511, tell it what kind of information you want and for what area, and the voice tells you what kind of traffic conditions to expect.

The trouble is, due no doubt to funky phone connections, the speaker's ability to articulate, and the phase of the moon, the traffic guy - whom I've named Kevin - doesn't always understand what you're saying. Sometimes the misunderstanding is understandable and predictable. When Kathy lived in Pinole, this would be her conversation:

Kevin: "Say your ending point."

Kathy: "Pinole."

Kevin: "Sunol. Was that right?"

Kathy: "No. PINole."

Kevin: "Sunol. What was that?"

Kathy: "PINOLE!"

Kevin: "Sunol. Was that right?"

Kathy: "No! <Smothering a sigh> Hercules."

Kevin: "Hercules. Was that right?"

Now, with Sunol and Pinole, the system could be forgiven for it's confusion. But explain to me this:

Alix: "680 and 24 interchange."

Kevin: "Monster Park. Was that right?"

Alix: "...?"

(Kathy had the system interpret "Concord" as "Monterra" ... um, explain that?)

Okay, okay, I shouldn't pick on the system. Overall, it does an amazing job of understanding radically different voices and speech patterns. It's certainly 100 times better than than the voice technology that I tried out a couple of years ago when I had a frozen shoulder that prevented me from typing. I spent hours "training" the system to understand my voice, to little benefit. It was constantly getting things wrong, sometimes in embarrassing ways.

Perhaps the funniest moment was when I was exchanging instant messages with a friend. I was wearing a microphone and would speak my message followed by the word 'Send.' Dragon NaturallySpeaking would type it into the IM window and send off the message for me. Only, when I sneezed, it sent the message: "Who took history?"

Yeah, those are pretty cerebral sneezes that I've got going on.

Back to 511. Because I don't commute, I don't have to call 511 often. Kathy has to use it daily, so she occasionally feeds me little tips, such as, "don't cough - it will transfer you to Paratransit." Good to know.

The other day, though, I was the one commuting and had to give Kevin a ring. I was going to see my orthopedic surgeon for an 8:30 am appointment in San Francisco - my favorite time to drive to the City! (Not.) I called 511 just as I got onto the freeway. I specified my starting point of Walnut Creek and the ending point of San Francisco. Kevin said that the driving time would be 28 minutes!

Bwahahahaha - in my dreams! I'm going to take three freeways, go through one tunnel and across the Bay Bridge at 7 am in 28 minutes?!? I don't think so! I burst out laughing at this suggestion, wondering if this was a helicopter flying time.

Kevin heard my laugh and said, "I'm sorry, I thought I heard you say good-bye. Do you really want to exit the system?"

He's nothing if not polite. I regained my composure, said "no," and tried to behave myself. I don't want Kevin to think I don't like him, after all.

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