If sitcoms were written in Arizona – AZ 511

It’s a good thing that (to my knowledge) no sitcom writing teams live and work in Arizona, because if they did, AZ 511 would be airing right after America’s Most Asinine Idol – or whatever that puss-bucket of a show is called.

For those not in the know, AZ 511 is Arizona’s state-of-the-art information system about roadways and such. There’s a website, that’s actually useful, and then there’s the automatic phone response system that can keep you up-to-date on the latest roadway conditions.

Everybody knows how frustrating those automated phone attendants are, but I don’t find them all that difficult, but I met my match with AZ 511 today.

When the system first came out, Irene tried calling them once while I was driving and the results were hilarious – for me, that is. She found it incredibly frustrating. The system is designed to work on voice response, and despite the fact that Irene’s English is excellent for a non-English speaking immigrant, she does have a bit of an accent. She could not navigate the voice response system without the system misunderstanding and putting her on the wrong track. At the time we decided that it was technology whose time had not yet come.

About 2 weeks ago, someone was bragging to me how wonderful the system was. This person is easily impressed, so I challenged them on their opinion, and after just a few moments of discussion they admitted that the system was only useful if you used the touch tone system.

Today, many months after our first and only experiences with AZ 511, I was the passenger, and we were concerned about what appeared to be an accident on the I-17 that might delay our return home.

I dialed in. It went like this

“Touch tone mode. For roads, press 1, for transit press 2, for airports press 3, for tourism press 4, for quick reports press 5. You can leave a comment at any time by pressing 8. Press * at any time to return to speech mode.”

I press “1”

It says, “OK, enter roadway #”

I think… umm, I have an alphanumeric road number (I-17), well, I’ll try 17.

It says, “One Seven, I’m sorry, that’s not a valid road selection.”

I try 4-1-7 (4 being the numeric key that hosts “i” on the keypad“)

It says, ”Four One Seven, I’m sorry, that’s not a valid road selection.“

Pissed off already, I hit ”8“ to leave a comment.

It says, ”Eight, I’m sorry, that’s not a valid road selection.“

Even more irritated, I try something like 3-5-6-3-5

It says, ”Three Five Six Three Five, I’m sorry, that’s not a valid road selection.“

I hit 6-0

and it starts to ramble on about highway 60, and it won’t stop. On and on it drones, ending with a weather report that I don’t want to hear, but at least when it is done, it returns me to the menu. I choose ”8“ to leave a comment.

After a couple ”please-wait-while-I-transfer-you-to-leave-a-comments it tells me that’s not available and I hang up in anger.

That should have been enough for me, but it wasn’t. I called back to try the voice response system.

It goes something like this:

“Please say the word you want at any time. The menu choices are ROADS, TRANSIT, AIRPORTS, TOURISM, QUICK REPORTS and COMMENTS.”

“Roads”

“Say the name of the road you want. For a list, say LIST”

“LIST”

“Here is a list of roads. BLACK CANYON HIGHWAY” (For non-AZ folk, Black Canyon Highway is I-17).

I say, “Black canyon highway”, it says, “I’m sorry, I don’t understand you.”

I say, “Black Canyon highway”

It starts reading me the same report on highway 60.

“Stop! Menu! Exit! Roads!” But it won’t stop that damn report, so I hang up – again.

Once more. This time I’m ready. At the first menu I say, “roads”…

…and it says, “OK, Tourism. Do you want information from the Arizona Department of Tourism or the Grand Canyon National Monument?”

“Menu”

And it returns me to the main menu. I say “Roads”, it says “OK, Tourism”

and round and round we go. My first idea was, the woman recording the message has a bit of down-in-the-swamp states accent, so I try a southern drawl. No luck. I try BBC standard english. I try talking like a pirate. I try slow, fast, loud, soft, Russian, Australian, Bostonian. All I get is “Tourism” or “Airports.” No matter how you slice it, nobody could misunderstand the word “roads” as tourism or airports. Was this system even tested?!

Finally, finally I get the right response by using a hybrid combination Alabama drawl with just a hint of Scottish Highland lilt.

I am overjoyed! Can you imagine my feeling of triumph?! Can you guess how long it lasted? Exactly 15 seconds – because then I had to say, “Black Canyon Highway.”

To which the satanic mechanical monster from the seventh ring of hell at the other end said, “OK, Grand Canyon”.

“Menu” “Stop”

“I think you said ‘end call’ is that right?”

“No”

“Returning to main menu”

“Roads”

“OK, tourism”

“No”

“I think you just said ‘Grand Canyon’, is that right?”

“No”

“OK, transferring your call to the Grand Canyon.” And the call started to ring through.

I hung up, tried once more and got transferred to the Arizona Tourism Board, but finally, I got my road condition report. Of course, we were no longer driving by this time and didn’t need the report anymore.

Clearly a folly with taxpayers’ money.

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While I was writing this up, I called the 511 number a few times from my home phone to get the wording “just right” on some of the inane voice prompts and, from my home phone, it worked almost, but not quite flawlessly. Now, they do say that you should try to minimize background noise, but I ask you: Under what conditions is someone most likely to be calling a road condition information line?

Answer: On a cellphone, in a car, on the road. If the system doesn’t work reliably under those conditions, it’s complete waste of money and a total failure.

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