To think the lift is for anyone who needs it

[EeyoresEars]

Queuing up to use the lift at a busy station this week. There were about 6-8 people in front of me and I’m not sure how many behind. I waited for lift as I’m pregnant and couldn’t have carried my buggy down the long flight of stairs.

A woman who was using a wheelchair was a couple of people behind me in the queue and I heard her starting to complain, not directed at anyone, just talking loudly so everyone could hear. She kept saying she was going to miss her train because of all the lazy people who should carry their cases down the stairs instead of using the lift.

Then she started complaining about people not carrying buggies down the stairs. I kept ignoring her, as did everyone else, which I think made her more angry. She shouted to a staff member and asked what she was going to do about the lazy people in the queue. The staff member said there isn’t priority access for the lift and it’s safest for people not to carry heavy luggage on stairs if they don’t feel able to. The woman using the wheelchair kept on complaining and saying she was taking it further.

Aibu to think anyone who needs the lift can use it and if you have to queue then that’s just life?

At my station they've got big barriers in front of the stairs and escalator so that it's not possible to take luggage through and you're forced to take the lift. Which I think is really annoying but it does mean you don't have a choice.

So many of you trying to justify yourselves. I don't believe for a minute that most people using lifts at stations have invisible disabilities. Some yes, the majority no.

And they are not in a wheelchair with no other option.

It IS the same as a bus and the buggy issue. Wheelchairs get priority.

If you are able-bodied and have a heavy case you could, you know, ask if someone can help.

If you have a buggy, you could ask someone to help you carry it down the stairs (assuming this was not Covent Garden tube with hundreds of stairs).

And if you are just lazy, well jog on. Literally.

I've got costochondritis at the moment, and can't walk far without intense pain in my chest so I used the lifts in the hospital at the weekend. As far as I could see, there was no sign saying disabled people only above them. Yes some people are just lazy, some use them as they have to. I would give way to someone in a wheelchair but not if they were mouthing off - she may have been disabled but she was also rude.

I just cannot think of a time when on seeing a wheelchair I have not let them have priority. Even when I am with my disabled son. When he is in his wheelchair I have always been lucky that people go out of their way to help. She may have been rude but what other obstacles has she had to go through just to get to the lift.

It's a bit hypocritical of PPs to be calling for more understanding of disabilities whilst dismissing everyone else waiting for the lift as 'obviously' being able. The other people could all have had disabilities.

The person may be in the wheelchair as a short-term response to an accident. The person in front may be permanently disabled. The fact is that you can't tell people's medical history by looking at them.

On days where I was fit and able, I'd let the person in the wheelchair go in front. But, despite looking perfectly able, I currently have a broken coccyx and a hip injury. I can't carry anything heavier than a book. My leg can suddenly collapse. At some points, I'd be ok to wait for the next lift. At other points, I wouldn't. I can't predict which will be which so god knows how a stranger in a lift queue can.

As someone who had carpal tunnel syndrome, I would have been unable to carry a pram downstairs.

There's more kindness needed on all sides.

How do you spot disabled person MoreAndLess? Is a person in a wheelchair more disabled than my mum (with Alzheimer's - can't use stairs or escalators as mentioned above)? Or my long dead dad who had a heart condition so a few yards walking was all he could manage without a rest? Or my friend with MS.

None of those are visible disabilities but I'd say they are equal to the person who uses a wheelchair. But you can't see the disability so how do you spot them? Are they considered to be 'unreasonable' by not giving way to a person using a wheelchair just because they don't have a visual item showing they are disabled?

If my mum is waiting for a lift and there's a wheelchair user I'm afraid it's first come, first served. She's equally in need. If I'm waiting alone then of course I give way.

Disabled users are not just people who use a wheelchair, carry a stick or are on crutches.

I've been in broken's situation too as the disability worsened before I started using the chair. So I empathise with that too.

But.

You can't say that every single person in every single queue for every single lift needs it. That's not true, personal experience tells me that.

For example one of my kids had an important overnight stay in a central London hospital last week. Annoyingly the place to get the blue badge parking validated is on a different level (only one floor) from the actual car park. So I waited in the lift lobby to get a lift down one floor. All six of the lifts were at the top of the building (12 floors up I believe) and unfortunately the other lift banks don't go to Lower Ground floor. So I had to use one of this six. The lobby was packed but as we waited and waited people melted away to use stairs as they didn't want to wait. They had choices, you see.

When the lift arrived we headed straight for it but several people RAN for it and we only just managed to squeeze in at the front. Then I had to reverse out (see previous poster's post on how you have to wait at the side so get pushed in front of, how it's easier to get on first and turn around etc).

You can't say those people who ran to beat me to the lift really needed that lift, surely?

I didn't say everyone is able, I said not everyone has invisible disabilities. Some do, yes. Not all.

So many of you trying to justify yourselves
no need to justify ourselves, just explaining. The lifts are there for everybody, why should anyone be given priority as long as everybody respect the queue?

If someone asks nicely, I might try to let them first if I am not in a rush for my own train. If I am being called lazy whilst minding my own business, I will ignore them. It's more likely that I have my headphones on and I won't even hear or notice them anyway.

You don't need to have a disability or medical issue to justify using the lifts, they are there for the public whoever they are.

What would have been kind is if one of the able bodied people in the lift queue had assisted the woman in the wheelchair by grabbing the nearest station worker and ensuring they held her train for her.

Travelling about in a wheelchair is really bloody difficult. Yes she was rude but I would expect that was driven by frustration and anxiety about the whole bloody situation, which no doubt she faces all the time.

People with luggage that’s a bit heavy? Meh. Ask another person to help you with it and let people who don’t have that choice to use the stairs or escalator get in the lift.

So glad MNHQ are deleting some disablist posts. Being very understanding which is good to see. They're sorry I'm having to see some of these posts.

People with luggage that’s a bit heavy? Meh. Ask another person to help you with it

because that is a realistic solution in the real world is it

The lift was for the use of anyone who needed it. The OP needed it. In what universe would a pregnant lady suffering with SPD and carpal tunnel syndrome be unfair to use a lift when she also had to lug a small child in a pushchair up a flight of stairs on her own? The woman was rude. There was no excuse for rudeness especially when had she asked nicely then I'm sure people would have let her in ahead of them.

I get so sick of these threads where someone behaves atrociously and people somehow turn it around so that the OP is in the wrong despite being the innocent party.

Bishop I wasn't replying to your post. Statistically it's likely that some of the people won't have a 'need' to use the lift. But, on occasion, they will all need to use the lift and we can't tell which case is which.
If I was having a 'good day' then, of course, I would let the person in the wheelchair go first or the person with crutches. . . but my point was even if I did that, I'd be taking a visual reckoning of who needed the lift most and sometimes that visual reckoning is wrong.

And they are not in a wheelchair with no other option.
Sorry but even with someone grabbing the other end, lugging a buggy down stairs when your pregnant and have spd is dangerous. Whether op should have quietly waited until no one else needed the lift because women with buggies can't ever have anything important to dobe, or whether she should have queued as she did, its ridiculous to say she should have used the stairs. And that's not even going into all the examples upthread.

It IS the same as a bus and the buggy issue. Wheelchairs get priority.
Not unless you petition for a wheelchair only lift. Most have signs saying please walk if you can but there is no priority in a lift. I'd have let her go ahead if I wasn't in a rush, as I would with anyone but you don't know other people's stories

People with luggage that’s a bit heavy? Meh. Ask another person to help you with it and let people who don’t have that choice to use the stairs or escalator get in the lift.

What this ignores is that many stations don't want heavy cases on the stairs or escalators (presumably because it's a H&S risk) so make it impossible to take them through the gates.

You’re not allowed to carry luggage in case it falls and knocks over loads of people.

What would have been kind is if one of the able bodied people in the lift queue had assisted the woman in the wheelchair by grabbing the nearest station worker and ensuring they held her train for her
She's in a wheelchair, not non verbal. The worker she stopped to moan at about people in the queue could easily have been asked by her to hold the train. I would think it patronising in the extreme if someone had walked over to the guy and said "can you hold the train for this woman"

My mum is nearly 80. She isn't registered as disabled but she is very infirm and has previously toppled backwards down the stairs at a train station thus causing great injuries. She now takes the lift for her own safety and I don't see why she should be expected to use the stairs. Ditto for prams - it's completely impossible for me to carry a pram and a 16lb baby down stairs on my own, especially after a c-section which left me barely able to even push the pram for a number of weeks.

I do agree that able bodied people should use the stairs, and family groups should put one person in the lift while the others use the stairs. But I disagree that only those who are registered disabled should have priority to use the lift. It's for anyone who can't manage the stairs.

Would it not be patronizing to say “you go ahead”?

My mum had to use a wheel chair if we went out for any longer than a quick walk. She never ever felt the need to harrass and abuse people queuing for lifts.

Just because you use a wheel chair doesnt automatically make you a nice person and this person was being a dick.
Pp seem to be missing the points op made.
She had a friend with her she wasnt struggling with anything.
Everyone was getting the same train so she wasnt in any bigger hurry than anyone else.
The train had wc access.
People shouldnt be taking buggies etc down stairs its dangerous.

Abusing strangers then expecting consideration is a stupid thing to do. She had no need to do it and just because you cant see disabilities doesnt make your disability 'priority'.

Everyone was going for a train everyone had the right to be in the lift. It wasnt a queue for the disabled loo after all.

Having had cts its hellish and really affects your ability to grip things never mind adding in spd. People saying op should have wrangled a buggy downstairs are barking.

In certain circunstances wheelchair users should get priority but it doesnt give them a free pass in every day life to hurl abuse at other people who dared to be doing exactly the same as they are. Its not disabled people bashing its 'being a dick' bashing.

I do agree that able bodied people should use the stairs
sorry, but why?

If there are escalators, I use them instead of stairs because it's quicker. If I want to use the lifts, why wouldn't I?

Luggage, pram, tiredness, unwell, disability, or just can't be bothered with the stairs, everybody has the same right to the lifts.

People on this thread seem to be making a thousand different excuses as to why it was ok for a woman in a wheelchair to be pushed past and ignored when she was in need.

No one here knows her circumstances.

Letting a person in a wheelchair go into a lift first is just basic common human decency. Just because SHE was rude doesn’t mean everyone else has to suddenly turn into an inconsiderate shit.

The OP clearly also needed to use the lift. If others, who were capable of using the stairs, and asking other people for help with luggage if need be, had left the lift for the people who really needed it then a great deal of distress - and this ridiculous thread - could have been avoided entirely.

CanaBanana
But I disagree that only those who are registered disabled should have priority to use the lift

I don’t think anyone has suggested that. 🤷🏻‍♀️ Lifts are for everyone but people with disabilities whether they be hidden or not should be given priority. That doesn’t mean people who can’t use the stairs for other reasons such as illness, luggage or whatever shouldn’t use the lifts.