Prams and buses!

[bluedungareesandspottytrainers]

Hi!

First time mum but long time poster (I've nc!)

I'm getting the bus with my baby today. The journey takes about 45 mins and I'm already worrying about it 🤦🏻‍♀️ He will sleep the journey I would imagine and is not a baby that cries a lot so that is not my worry.

I have to be there for a certain time so my plan is to get the earlier bus just in case there's already a pram / wheelchair user on board.

But what if I'm on the bus and someone with a wheelchair wants to get on? My pram doesn't fold down. Do I get off? I've no idea what the etiquette is for this and don't want to be a nob!

I'm aware I'm worrying over a hypothetical situation. I'm a bit stressed about some other things so I think I've blown this out of proportion 🙈

I was lucky in that I caught the era of the bendy buses in London. Very impractical in some ways but they had a lot of wheelchair space, I think may be 2 or even 4 could fit. You could certainly cram a lot of buggies in.

I don't see how people are still not getting that wheelchair users have priority.

Don't be so dramatic @RuffleCrow. I live in London and can't drive so I had to get a bus home after giving birth and had to hold my DD (got an Uber there). It really wasn't the end of the world and somehow we both survived.

@OneForTheRoadThen I assure you I am a long time mumsnetter and my post was genuine.

It would be easy for mumsnet to look back at my previous posts (nc) and see I do have a new born and that I am an overly anxious over thinker 🤦🏻‍♀️🙈

That's London priviledge speaking there @OneForTheRoadThen. If you've never lived with a baby and a toddler in a rural village and no money for a car you have no idea. I'm not accepting your patronising "don't be so dramatic" - the MN equivalent of ''calm down dear". I will not calm down about the pain and injury I have endured as a the result of bending over backwards to 'be a good girl' and 'put others first' when my body was in a state of trauma from a difficult birth.

You have no idea about my background or circumstances @RuffleCrow so how about you just pipe down. You sound ridiculously bitter.

Having a baby and a toddler is a choice.
Living in a rural area is a choice.
Being a wheelchair user is not a choice.

berlin agreed. Bus after bus would whizz past stops, not allowing any passengers on as they'd be full - but with empty wheelchair areas. I have rarely seen a wheelchair at either a bus stop or on a bus.

The bus drivers need to be trained in resolving these situations. Signage needs to be crystal clear.

I'm not accepting either your opinion on my character or your patronising command. You said you were living in London at the time and had money for an Uber! Don't act like i've just invented the specific information you gave about yourself @OneForTheRoadThen

@RuffleCrow yes I had £5 for an Uber to take me to the hospital at 4am after my waters had broken. That's London privilege right there 😂

You carry on refusing to get off the bus for wheelchairs. I'll carry on thinking you're selfish and entitled.

Yes, arseholes who think newly delivered mothers have cast iron muscles, limitless strength and limitless cash to purchase expensive buggies just for the priviledge of using public transport. The same arseholes who would never be in this position themselves because they mainly travel by SUV or the nanny does it for them.

How about arseholes who think that the world owes them a favour because they have reproduced.

Get the fuck out of the wheelchair spaces if someone in a wheelchair needs to get on the bus. End of story! Any other argument about it just makes you sound like more of a twat.

Glad the journey went well OP. I know the bus anxiety well as my main pram doesn't fold easily with new born attachment.
I bought an ergo baby sling and have a cheap chicco oh lala pushchair which is not glamorous but folds in a jiffy and is super light.
I had a funny incident a couple of weeks back though. I was on holiday in Ireland where buses have a slightly larger buggy and wheelchair space than uk. Saw what I thought was a man in a wheelchair and a lady with a double pram was in front of me in the queue so I fastidiously folded my pushchair and managed to get my struggling, angry in need of a nap toddler onto my giant pregnant lap. Suddenly I realise the man wasn't a wheelchair user, he had a huge folding bike taking up the space. Didn't offer to move or help or anything. Selfish twat!

You're discriminating on the basis of both maternity and parental status there @MidniteScribbler just FYI. Not ok. Not legal in the uk.

Just keep digging RuffleCrow. You're getting deeper and deeper.

And I'm not in the UK, so I don't give a shit. At least people are fuckwits about people with disabilities where I live.

ffs its a WHEELCHAIR space.
its not discrimination to prioritise wheelchairs in a WHEELCHAIR SPACE,

I hate this debate, and honestly I find it so disappointing that nothing went into the Bus Services Act 2017 after the Paulley case. That case was (IMO) far too lenient; yes, it said that wheelchair users have priority over wheelchair spaces, and yes it said that bus drivers need to do more than just asking others to vacate that space. It also waxed lyrical about the fact that requests to move must be reasonable, and that anyone refusing to move will doubtlessly believe he or she is being reasonable. It essentially pandered to the view that someone's reticence to fold a buggy could be reasonable to them, and therefore if the bus driver agreed, that'd be the end of it.

I keep coming back to Baroness Hale's argument, particularly in light of the fact that the buggy argument is always bolstered with "sex is a protected characteristic too!". Yes, sex is. Being a parent isn't.

"Three general points can be made about the legislative framework which is now in place... The third, and most obvious, is that service providers owe positive duties towards disabled people, including wheelchair users, which they do not owe to other members of the travelling public, including parents travelling with small children in baby buggies or other people travelling with bulky luggage. The Court of Appeal, in my view, fell into the trap of assuming that the claims of disabled travellers were no different from the claims of any other person wishing to use the buses. They are not. Disabled people are, for very good reasons, a special case."

The absence of any legal requirement to move is what continues the pattern by which wheelchair users are discriminated against when using public transport, and allows people who refuse to move to justify so doing on the basis that their needs are the same. It boils my blood, it really does.

that is why I think only wheelchairs should use them, even if they are left empty. as we see from this thread and the other one running, too many parents refuse to realise they need to fold.

(For completeness, I'm aware that pregnancy and maternity is a protected characteristic. But that does not mean that in the specific legal situation described here - i.e. access to public transport - that that protected characteristic is treated precisely the same as the protected characteristic of disability. Or, in other words, that a parent with a buggy has exactly the same legal access rights and requirement for adjustments to be made, as a wheelchair-user on public transport.)

(And, for further completeness, it couldn't be the case that pregnancy and maternity entitled buggy-users to the same treatment as wheelchair-users, because if it did, it would apply only to women with buggies. There's no equivalent protected characteristic for paternity, so men with buggies would be treated differently to women with buggies, and itself cause discrimination. That's the difficulty in applying that particular protected characteristic to access to public transport.)

@RuffleCrow parental status is not a protected characteristic.

It's a wheelchair space for wheelchair users. Quite simply those passengers have a right to use their designated spaces.

That isn't what the law states: they are usually mixed use spaces where wheelchair users have priority if other passengers can reasonably expected to move to accomodate them @ilovesooty

I don't see why someone with a buggy can't reasonably be expected to move to accommodate a wheelchair user.

You sound delightful @MidniteScribbler what a shame you're not here in the uk but stuck over there with your beloved 'fuckwits'!