Wheelchair / buggy on bus

[MoonlightMistletoe]

Today I had got the bus with my sister we both have children I had my toddler who was walking and my one year old who's only just started to walk who is still in a buggy, my sister has a 12week old baby who was also in a buggy.

We had got on the bus as you do and the next stop another parent got on with their buggy, a few stops later we stop and straight away a woman is screaming/shouting at the rear doors with her phone in our faces demanding we collapse our buggies, very angry , shouting at us with buggies and also at the driver. The driver is telling us to stay put due to her being aggressive and recording us. Someone on the bus was telling us to co operate with the woman who wanted to get a person on the bus who was in a wheelchair. We know disabled people are a priority and had absolutely not said we wouldn't put the buggies down, I was taking my sleeping one year out the buggy while this woman was still swearing and being nasty and recording us, I had given my baby to my sister to sit with my toddler and herself while I was about to take her baby out the pram then all of a sudden everyone made a "ohhhhhhh" gasp and the disabled man has fallen down the side of the curb and bus sideways in his wheelchair.

She then looses her absolute shit at us for her own mistakes being so caught up in recording us to make sure we move that the man is now probably injured.

AIBU to think all she had to do was say excuse me can we move the buggies so I can get the wheelchair on?

@lisag1969 I’m still waiting for a list of people, aside from you, who think I’m rude and who I’m annoying.

Your attitude is horrendous, with your talk of “deserving” things with regards to wheelchair users. I’ll tell you what I deserve - to be able to use public transport with the same ease as an able bodied person. To be able to get on and off any bus or train that I damn well want to, the same way able bodied people can. To not be at the mercy of a driver who decides he can’t be arsed to put the ramp down for me because it’s raining or because I have a “stupid wheelchair”. To not have able bodied people touching, pushing, leaning on or sitting on the arm of my wheelchair.

I also deserve not to be bullied by a disablist with an agenda to derail this thread.

I think more and more bus companies will end up going down the road the one locally will

One buggy space. One buggy

One wheelchair space. One wheelchair only. No buggies in that space even when it’s completely quiet because people can’t be trusted not to have WWIII when asked to move, even though the moving policy used to be very clear as well

@gingersausage i have not seen you being rude, just tirelessly speaking up for people like my dd.
thank you

you say he opened the doors but to let her on if it’s back doors like you say the doors need to be shut for the ramp to be put down. If the doors were open he had no intention of letting her on

Not every bus is the same. where I live buses just have manual ramps that are flipped out, both at the front and back the bus, so the doors have to be opened for the ramps to be pulled out.

Also, when I did live in an area where the ramps were automatic the driver would always open the doors first to inform the wheelchair user he was going to be putting the ramp down so that they could either move back (if they were in the space needed for the ramp to be put out) or reposition themselves to get on before closing the doors to put down the ramp.

This thread has been an eye opener and I hate to admit it but it’s changed my views.

I am lucky enough to live where the majority of buses have dedicated buggy and wheelchair spaces but when they don’t I think i will try to start folding.

I thought it was okay to fold if a wheelchair user was about to board but I can see now how stressful it might be for the wheelchair user wondering if I’ll vacate (I always would) or if the bus driver would enforce this if I was an arse.

It’s a bit more faff for me on a temporary basis but I think hearing how inaccessible public transport still is for the very people who campaigned for it perhaps we all need to be more aware.

@gingersausage

I have not meant to be rude to anyone.
I was just saying in my original post that nobody disabled or not should be rude to anyone.
But then I got cross with people saying I shouldn't say that ect.
I have a disability myself and was just saying that doesn't give me or anyone else an excuse to be.
I am not being rude just voicing my opinion as we all do.
I agree with you sticking up for your dd. Bless her. The lady shouting on the bus in the original post was not nice and now this post has turned into something else altogether. Best wishes to you x

Why are people unable to think ahead? Think about how to manage the number of children you have with you as well as all the shopping and all the other equipment children/babies require, and work out what goes where so you can manage in difficult situations, say on a crowded bus. Assume that you will have to fold your buggy. Assume that you will have to fold your buggy, all seats are taken and no-one will move for you. Assume that you are an independent, strong woman who can deal with these little set backs quite easily. If you need advice from a strong independent woman who does manage, ask her.

I am confined to my small town unless drives me somewhere because I can't cope with the fuss made by people who don't want my disabled ass on their bus when they have important children's activities to get to. Can't cope with mean spiitedness, fuss at having to hold their child in their arms, tutting involved, filthy looks as if I've taken their space rather than they having taken mine. I feel guilty enough about my draining of society and now I just stay at home.

Sounds about right @Jux

@lisag1969
You may be disabled. It has not stopped you from not listening and being disablist yourself. I am not in a wheelchair. But take steps to listen to those, that are. Your first post yesterday was so incredibly tone deaf. My mouth hit the floor. I do wonder if your disability is one, which makes you invisible. I can only think not. I am invisible. I know what that feels like and would never presume to define others in the way that you have.

I absolutely don't think it is the job of people who use wheelchairs to facilitate other members of the public to travel.
However it is far too simplistic to imagine that everyone else is in peak mental and physical health and is able to move around public transport unhindered in any way.
As a twin mum no amount of planning would shrink the size of the buggy I used (I bought the smallest one made) or lessen the extreme sleep deprivation I was suffering or the post birth impact on my body for the first year after dc's birth.
Likewise someone suffering from anxiety can't just plan that away.
People living on low incomes with dc, with no alternative shopping options can't wish that away either.
I was lucky my financial options meant I could opt out of public transport but not everyone can have that option (and with the planet currently burning up more people should be encouraged onto it)
Public transport needs to work better for everyone who uses it. It is the failure of the system if the users can't access it not the failure of the users.
That applies to those who use wheelchairs and those who have other additional needs.

We are talking about one space, the only space a wheelchair user can use.
All the other what ifs are not relevant. A wheelchair user should always be able to access this one space. It is up to other bus users to find other ways to solve their issues. It is not, or should not be up to someone who is already marginalised.

@Samcro it's also the only space a buggy can go and it's the place where the drivers tell you to go. There's a big sign saying buggies can be put there that's why people do that they don't do it to piss people off.

I have never seen buses like that. Our local ones have a whole row of folding chairs where about 4 buggys can fit and then one proper wheelchair space.
If there is only one wheelchair space and no buggy space then surely buggys have to be folded? Getting confused here.

@Jux manage the amount of children they have ??? Independent strong woman ?? How rude are you?

I did assume I needed to move my buggy and I did just that , I'm not sure about being a strong independent woman though because I'd be lying if I said I was, I don't actually know a strong independent woman to ask advice of how to travel do you know how stupid and insensitive that is ? I had to ask my sister to get that bus with me because I haven't been on a bus in years , I can only just about get my child to school because I have raging anxiety that makes me shake and be sick, so a woman screaming at me as soon as the doors opened was out of order didn't even give me a chance to move , she was so angry at the wrong people that she done a shit job at caring that day because he ended up in the curb. I didn't make the rules , I followed them yet no one can accept that that woman was in the wrong !

@Mummyoflittledragon
I am entitled you my opinion and
I am not a disablist

I just think rude people who are trying to get on a bus shouldn't be allowed on the bus as they could be a danger to others.
That was my point
Well you have said what you think I have said what I think. Now leave it at that.
As we will not agree.

Your comments were disgusting. Now leave it as that. Used to stamping your feet are we?

I deserve - to be able to use public transport with the same ease as an able bodied person. To be able to get on and off any bus or train that I damn well want to, the same way able bodied people can. To not be at the mercy of a driver who decides he can’t be arsed to put the ramp down for me because it’s raining or because I have a “stupid wheelchair”. To not have able bodied people touching, pushing, leaning on or sitting on the arm of my wheelchair

Hear, hear, gingersausage

@Mummyoflittledragon
I'm not going to even bother trying anymore

You are just trying to argue with someone and I'm not going to rise
to it. People in glass houses and all that. Your comments are disgusting.

Oh Jux that is so painful to read. I’m so so sorry that you’re in this position.

(I’ve read you and admired your posts in MN for years ever since the harrowing threads of “Getting Bigger”, and the Chutney twunt. You give such good advice and a strong shoulder for other posters - it’s appalling that you have to live with such constraints caused by others’ thoughtlessness

You were not unreasonable to do as the bus driver asked.

I expect the bus driver said this because he will not tolerate, and in doing so encourage, angry and abusive people creating conflict on their bus.

It is generally seen (by drivers worth their salt) as a basic obvious duty to facilitate disabled people's use of the bus, so unless the driver was just crap it was the undesirable behaviour he was responding to.

Swearing and being aggressive to people is not ok for anyone to do, and it you are pushed for time when using public transport you have no right to abuse other people on that basis.

it's also the only space a buggy can go

That’s really not true - this point has been made many times on this (and other) threads. Most parents of babies in buggies are relatively able- bodied. They can collapse the push chairs and sit elsewhere in the bus.

Wheelchair users have only one place.

And other people who need accessible seating - the elderly most importantly - also need to sit down close to the bus entry/exit.

Having a baby is not (usually) a disabling event.

Heaven forbid the buggy users should have to vacate wheelchair spaces @steakandmantoo

Of course they have an entitlement. It's their space.

And thus with steakandtomato we hit the disablist jackpot

I’m alright Jack so who gives a fuck about a wheelchair user who needs to get somewhere.

steak
I’m gobsmacked. Some buses only run every hour. But hey ho tough shit for those pesky people in their wheelchairs. The driver should not be allowed to fill the bus to the point, where a person in a wheelchair and their career could be refused entry. The space belongs to them.