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Original poster

Buggies must be folded by law, if a wheelchair user wishes to board

999 replies

BerniceBroadside · 19/12/2013 08:33

I know this can be a hot topic so thought I'd share that stagecoach have new signs on their buses stating that buggies must be folded by law if a wheelchair user wishes to board. Let's hope it's actually enforced.

OP posts:
ParcelFancy · 20/12/2013 09:44

That's an interesting perspective, Lillilly.

Because as a wheelchair user mine's the opposite: I have to make plans around the fact that almost every time I use public transport, I have to move a buggy out of the wheelchair space.

I rarely use buses, so this happens on trains where I've actually reserved the wheelchair space and it's tagged to say so. But I still need another person to go on ahead and turf the inevitable buggy (and luggage) out, while I wait for all the manoeuvring to be finish.

fanjoforthemammaries7850 · 20/12/2013 09:46

Lillilly that's fine..but then you need to get off if someone using a wheelchair gets on and needs the space

Gileswithachainsaw · 20/12/2013 09:46

Well being able to get it on a bus if you know you will be using them surely is vital? Not all these prams fit on the wheelchair space cos of the pole.

fanjoforthemammaries7850 · 20/12/2013 09:47

If you do that then no you are not selfish nor stupid

Lillilly · 20/12/2013 09:59

Parcelfancy-
Perhaps it just depends where you live?
We have a massive elderly population which means the council has to pay for all their bus fairs, it is also a tourist town so lots of elderly visitors. Parents with buggies are big supporters of the bus services paying directly for their travel, so helping fund the service. Perhaps this is why they are well catered for . Our busses all have a wheelchair space plus 3 buggy spaces, and are frequent.

ParcelFancy · 20/12/2013 10:00

And yy to avoiding rush hour, Jaded.

Last time I travelled I had to change my journey time by four hours to meet all these restrictions. Because unlike those of you who can take any of 400 seats (or whatever) on a train, wheelchair spaces are limited to 2 - sometimes 1. If they're already booked for any part of my journey - that's it, I can't take the train. I also can't do some changes in the allocated time (and of course try to avoid them anyway), and as said above avoid rush hour.

So I'm already extremely limited in my choice of journeys (though glad to be able to travel at all). I'll do everything reasonable to help a buggy-pusher work round me - but you can see why I'm not planning to give up my journey for them.

I realise there are differences between trains and buses for buggy-pushers, but from the wc user's POV, most of the things issues will apply.

ParcelFancy · 20/12/2013 10:08

Lillilly, it's on long distance trains, so no, not just where I live. And I don't mind buggy-pushers taking wheelchair spaces (when they're not tagged) if these are empty - but as I say, my perspective is that I have to plan my travel around encountering buggies, whereas you and your DH have made a rational decision not to plan your travel around encountering wheelchairs.

But I'm interested in the rest of your post. Where you try to position buggy-users as subsidising the elderly.

Erm, is your child in the buggy paying a bus fare? At all? Never mind having the bus fare paid by the council - to which the elderly people pay their council tax?

ParcelFancy · 20/12/2013 10:11

To be clear, I don't mind your child not paying a bus fare. But I think a lot of people forget the benefits they're getting, when they cast an eye at other people's.

And BTW, being only disabled not elderly, I don't get free travel.

Lillilly · 20/12/2013 10:24

I agree re. Trains, they are just awful.
I wasn't particularly saying that parents subsidise the elderly, just that perhaps the fact that they are paying customers contributes to (what sounds in comparison to other areas) very good provision for parents with pushchairs.
That said, free bus travel for pensioners (who are some of the wealthiest in the country) costs our council millions, and could be better spent on more accessible transport. It would cover the cost if a lift at the train station for a start.

Sirzy · 20/12/2013 10:32

I upset a man on a train a few months back when he had left his bike in the wheelchair space and refused to move it for a wheelchair getting on - I got up and moved it for him! My sister had taken my nephew out of his pram and put the pram down rather than move his bike but someone in a wheelchair doesn't have that option.

ParcelFancy · 20/12/2013 10:33

You child in the buggy is not a paying customer! They might be accompanied by one, but they are a passenger and are travelling for free.

This is fine.

It's not fine to pretend your child isn't a free passenger.

Especially given all the jaw-flapping on this thread about how the child's rights as a passenger compare to a wheelchair user's rights as a passenger.

ParcelFancy · 20/12/2013 10:37

Thanks Sirzy

It's lovely to have just one less battle to fight on any given journey.

ParcelFancy · 20/12/2013 10:47

And Lillilyy, relax. There's no need for all this "Look! Over there! Blame THEM!"

You've made a rational decision to get a large buggy, based on your needs and on the buses you're most likely to use. You would (I'm sure) offer to get off the bus in the very rare event that you encountered a wc user needing the wc space.

You even thought it through before buying. Thanks

You're doing everything right! Please don't feel defensive about that!

kungfupannda · 20/12/2013 10:51

I wish the people saying that it's first come first served had been on Brixton high street the day there was a woman with obvious and serious disabilities crying hysterically at the bus-stop, surrounded by concerned people trying to reason with a succession of buggy-users and bus-drivers who were refusing to enforce the wheelchair priority. She had been sitting there in the cold for ages while bus after bus went past. The drivers just kept saying they couldn't make people fold, and the buggy-users either shouted and yelled, or moaned and complained about discrimination, or just refused to engage at all.

We had to get some PCSOs to come and deal with it eventually.

That's what it took to get an extremely distressed, seriously disabled woman into the spot she was entitled to use.

Police involvement.

JustforMe · 20/12/2013 10:53

I have a massive double buggy and have no problem shrinking it to a single so a wheelchair user may pass and go one side ( I can fit a double and a wheelchair on our buses). I also don't mind getting off if I have to but I need to get off BEFORE the wheelchair user gets on.

Curtosy extends both ways to many times have I moved or got off for rude wheelchair users who don't even bother with a simple thank you.

JadedAngel · 20/12/2013 11:03

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

kungfupannda · 20/12/2013 11:08

My office was right behind the bus-stops - not fun!

Having said that, I always found Brixton to be somewhere that people tended to get involved if someone was obviously in serious need. There were a lot of people trying to help that day - a lot of older people, but also a couple of teenage boys. The lads probably weren't terribly helpful really, because they kept giving the bus-drivers/passengers a mouthful, which wasn't exactly calming the situation, but good for them for caring.

ParcelFancy · 20/12/2013 11:25

Ugh, "were", not "where"!

And I ask in advance for any other crimes against the English language today to be taken into account.

DownstairsMixUp · 20/12/2013 12:06

No one gives a shit about bad grammar on a thread like this.

DownstairsMixUp · 20/12/2013 12:08

Sorry but its a bug bear for me. Its all superiority rubbish. As long as i understand what it says its fine plus this is a heated thread. Not a school lesson.

Kendodd · 21/12/2013 13:21

I had 3 under 15 months and a double buggy with buggy board.Not enough arms.If you were already on would you have to get off?

At the risk of being flamed. If I was in a wheelchair I would wait for the next bus rather than make a mum with two babies and a toddler get off the bus. I'm not saying that wheelchair users don't have priority, just that I wouldn't do this even if I did legally have priority.

tiggytape · 21/12/2013 13:29

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

SpikeyChristmasTree · 21/12/2013 13:39

Kendodd, I think the 'if I was in a wheelchair' tells us that you really have no clue what you would actually do should you become a person with a disability.

People choose to have babies, with all the hardwork that entails. So you (generic you) either fold or get off the bus. If you don't like it, you campaign for buggy spaces. Expecting a wheelchair user to wait for hours in the cold because you struggle to vacate the space they are legally entitled to is selfish in the extreme.

TondelayoSchwarzkopf · 21/12/2013 14:23

You have no idea what you would do if you were in a wheelchair if you make statements like that. Try having some empathy and imagination about what life day to day in a wheelchair is like. Biscuit

Dawndonnaagain · 21/12/2013 14:26

Ken. It's a false premise really, as Spieky has said, you have no idea of what a disability entails. There are many different ones and they have differing effects on different people, so until you know what will affect you and what won't, it's impossible to make such a statement legitimately.