2 strollers per bus

[GingerBeverage]

How many times have you been told you can't get on a bus because there are already 2 strollers on board?
I'd have thought that any analysis of London bus users would highlight that people with strollers are some of the biggest users of the service.
Would it be SO terrible to have a little more space for us, and for wheelchair users?

Just to add I have a Yoyo, literally the tiniest buggy you can buy.

I don't know why they don't just redesign buses and make all of the seats fold down.

Then the bus can accommodate whoever needs to be on there - more passengers standing at busy times, multiple pushchair and wheelchair users or seats if the bus is not busy and nobody needs to stand up.

Making additional space for pushchairs is always going to be at the loss of seating on the lower deck. I’d have thought any analysis of London transport would actually show that commuters are the greatest users of it. Honestly, I think pushchair users have to accept that sometimes there isn’t going to be enough space on the bus and have a workaround - such as a light buggy which can easily be folded rather than a pram the size of a tank, or using a sling for younger babies.

I don't know why they don't just redesign buses and make all of the seats fold down.

I suspect that this would result in the same issue as currently affects wheelchair users: the same selfish pram pushers who refuse to move out of the wheelchair space would refuse to move and let the seats be folded down for those who needed to sit on them.

I imagine it's more tricky for people with multiple small children or other issues but I always managed fine just folding mine or using a baby carrier.

More space for wheelchair and pram users would be at the expense of the back door and/or lower deck seating. The back door is important for passenger flow and it would be counter-intuitive to reduce the space for passengers on a transport system designed to carry as many passengers as possible. Plus most London buses have a step up to the back so the only seats that would be lost are those that are accessible to those with mobility issues that aren't in a wheelchair.

Fold down seats wouldn't work because they are easily broken, so would require regular maintenance.

London buses are so frequent, I'm not sure why you cant just wait for the next one.

Where I live the buses are packed with commuters during morning and evening rush hour, during the day the buses are full of old people using their free bus passes to get out of the house. These people are entitled to get a seat, you could say the old people especially.

On a lot of my local buses there is only buggy space. A lot of Mums that I see have a pre-schooler in a lightweight stroller and another adult with them, the child isn't in the pushchair because they want to sit on the bus but they insist on taking the buggy space anyway, so annoying!

They won't make extra space for prams. Why would they? The child in pram doesn't even pay a fare, but adults in seats do.
Completely off topic and not relevant but I hate the word "stroller" (and "buggy") Both make my teeth itch when I hear or read them.

On double decker buses it makes sense to have wheelchair/standing room and priority seats only on the bottom. It would benefit everyone.

It would probably be better for manufacturers to make prams that fold.

BonnyConnie it really wouldn't.
Drivers barely give you enough time to get up or down them before they start to move. Many able bodied people struggle with them, me included.
I can already imagine how many people would challenge people with invisible diabilities who struggle with the stairs daring to sit downstairs in "their" space.

On double decker buses it makes sense to have wheelchair/standing room and priority seats only on the bottom. It would benefit everyone.

No it wouldn't. Lots of people prefer to sit on the bottom deck for long journeys. Most people can fold their buggies.

Decent luggage space would be more useful- including for folded pushchairs.

The buses in Brighton are great, half of one side of the downstairs is fold down seats - you can fit 3/4 pushchairs or 1 wheelchair plus 2 pushchairs or have lots of standing space when its busy. Not sure why more towns don't have buses like that.

This is really unreasonable. Thousands of commuters use buses every day and pay a fair, they deserve a fair chance to get a seat.

At the end of the day a buggy is not a person and so should not have more rights on the bus. Get a foldable pram and be considerate of others, we're all busy and all have lives to be getting on with.

Decent luggage space would be more useful- including for folded pushchairs.
There is an airport close enough to me that you only have to have to only get one bus there, even if it takes 3-4 hours in peak traffic. They have the front half the bus as luggage storage (and wheelchair seating). They don't let you on unless you are going directly to the airport, but sometimes they use those buses to run the regular routes for whatever reason. Bliss, as they won't let pushchairs on unless they are folded due to limited seating room- more people have to stand.

Also, as PP have said, I've seen so many selfish push-chair users refuse to vacate the wheelchair priority space when a wheelchair user gets on, so I'm not keen to provide more opportunity for this to happen.

@Camomila because ~6.5 million bus journeys are made per day in London, which is about 26x the population of Brighton. The whole point of mass transit in a highly populated city is to transport as many people as possible in as few vehicles as possible. You'd need more buses per route with a layout like you've suggested, and I'm not sure anyone wants more buses on the roads here.

Other towns likely do have similar space available but the passenger volume pales in comparison.

Can I sum up the main points that will be made?

• all pushchair pushers are selfish snowflakes
• no pushchairs should be allowed unfolded on any buses no matter how empty / how many babies they contain / how old the babies are
• back in the day mothers single handedly folded a quad pushchair with 4 other toddlers and 3 months of shopping and they were happy about it

sleeping

I travel on London buses daily with my DC and we also have a yo-yo pram. I'm also disabled so whilst I will (and do) fold my pram if need be, I'm horrified by other people refusing to make space for wheelchair users.

I do think that the lack of luggage space is an issue, I often find the wheelchair/pushchair area is full of suitcases.

The buses where I live even if you folded your buggy you wouldn't have anywhere to put it as the basket things you used to be able to put them in they've taken out. So if you were to take the folded buggy with you to the seat you'd be taking a seat up trying to store your folded stroller 🤷🏻‍♀️
You could get 3 strollers on our buses without using the disabled bay though if you all put them straight.

I’m not in London but used to live in a big city where buses weren’t as frequent as London buses. I once had to wait about 45 mins in the snow with two toddlers before two buses came that already had prams on so no space for mine, it was soul destroying. I learnt to drive after that, never wanted to deal with shit like that again.

The eco conscious want us all to use public transport more but I don’t think it’s fit for purpose outside of London. I live in a small town now where buses are every half an hour, if they even turn up.

Oh and I couldn’t physically fold it and hold onto a baby and toddler, it was an Icandy double so you had to take two seats off before folding the frame. Some prams can’t be easily folded.

Not all prams are easily folded down. I have a silver cross pioneer and that means taking the seat off and my daughter out to then fold the base down all whilst holding my daughter and watching my son. I dont agree that if theres a pram on already and someone in a wheelchair wants to get on that I should have to get off and then pay again for my journey whilst disrupting it. I've never actually seen anyone get off a bus to let a wheelchair user on saying that.

I'm in Glasgow, previously lived in Edinburgh, and you are only allowed one pram/buggy on at a time. The first time I went to London and saw three buggies squished in side by side I was really surprised - bus drivers up here are very strict about the buggy facing into the bus with the handles against the backrest. If someone else tries to get on with a buggy they have to fold it.