To be upset about the treatment of disabled people after this?

[Livingtothefull]

DH, DS & I headed off this afternoon for a planned evening out. DS is in a wheelchair. We got to the bus stop closest to us and waited for a bus. And waited and waited.

It was very cold & DS was complaining of being cold. DS can get cold more easily than us as he is not walking or moving around. Eventually left the bus stop and walked into town where there were likely to be more buses. Waited some more and eventually a bus actually came, nearly an hour by now after we had started waiting for the next bus although they should normally come every 10 mins or so.

I waited to get on the bus at the front while the driver tried to get the wheelchair ramp down. Overheard a few complaints from some other passengers 'why can't they let us on first before the ramp?'. Eventually though the driver said that the ramp wasn't working so he couldn't let us on.

I told the driver we could manage without the ramp but he refused as he said he couldn't be responsible for that. I just lost it then said we needed to get my DS on, he was cold and we couldn't wait longer for a bus. The driver said no though tried to call to find out when the next bus was coming & couldn't get any information. Some passengers gave up and left the bus to walk while this was going on, a few of them with dirty looks in our direction.

The driver said that he couldn't locate the next bus although one should arrive 'soon'. I did apologise to the driver for losing my temper, appreciated it was not his fault and he had tried to help us. We gave up then.

Finally.....a bus arrived that we could get on, although there was an empty buggy in the wheelchair space that we needed to fit around. No small children nearby so probably the buggy owner had taken the child upstairs in the double decker and left the buggy to be in the way of wheelchair users. Happens a lot.

I know this sounds like a long rant so let me know if IABU. But I just want us to have nice days and evenings out like everyone else without hassles, frustrations and upsets.

So, AIBU to complain about:

A public transport infrastructure that is unreliable despite many vulnerable people needing to rely on it. If a bus's doors were not working and people couldn't access, it would be called out of service. So why is it acceptable to have a bus in service when the ramp doesn't work?

The attitudes and behaviours of a significant minority of people. Why is it acceptable to openly complain when prioritising the disabled mildly affects them? Why is it acceptable to dump buggies (or trollies etc) in the wheelchair space?

Sorry you had that experience, it’s not nice to be treated like that. People need to be more patient.

YANBU, that sounds awful and should not have happened
I hope you managed to have a nice evening when you eventually got to your destination

YANBU accessible services in this country are awful. I have some sympathy for very old buildings, heritage transport and what not, but a modern bus, none whatsoever. I have a very mild mobility issue and I quite often struggle so I can’t even imagine the struggle for those with more significant issues. Sorry you’ve had this horrible experience.

In my eseprience society still largely thinks that disabled people are "in the way". There are numerous threads on here about disabled people falsely claiming benefits and getting "free cars". Ignoring the fact that many of us work and pay taxes, and those who can't need and deserve a society that doesn't treat them as rubbish.

It isn't about patience - people need to stop treating people with disabilities like we are perpetually in their way or fraudsters. I have limited mobility and I walk slowly with a rollator. I'd be rich if I had £1 for every time someone slammed a door in my face because I didn't get there fast enough for their liking; or for each argument I have had about the fact that you do not have to be blind to have a service dog!

Bad attitude about disability isn't nearly as rare as it ought to be in (nearly) 2023.

When the pandemic hit, disabled people were told they would not be “eligible” for a ventilator. What else do you need to know about how they are valued?

I had a bus driver say to me a few weeks back "you don't need me to put the ramp out", for a gap of about a foot. I said "yes please, I do" and he said, "nah, you don't".

I will admit that I did reply at that point that regardless of how far I had of a run up, the chair couldn't fucking fly!

He put the ramp out.

@Quveas I didn’t mean the op needed to be patient. I meant the other passengers.

I hate to sound insensitive, but it just comes down to supply and demand really doesn’t it. There aren’t enough wheelchair users to justify spending the amount of money that would be needed to make a select few lives more convenient. I’m not saying it’s right at all. In a perfect world, with unlimited money of course you would have a bus every 10 mins with everything working and ramps etc. but the public purse has to decide where the £ is best spent, schools, hospitals etc. there’s just not enough to go around. It sucks. I’m sorry you are suffering. If it is something you are truly passionate about you could look into starting your own community transport for disabled people, there are grants available.

YANBU at all. There's so much talk about inclusivity at the moment but this never seems to extend to any tangible differences being made for disabled people. I'm sorry you have and your DS have to experience this. IMO at lot more should and could be done to include disabled people fully in every day life.

That is truly AWFUL, @Livingtothefull
I feel so ashamed at the other passengers' behaviour, they could have damn well HELPED, not moaned.
Your poor laddie. :-(
Big hugs to you both. x

What a load of insensitive bollocks

Wow @Spaghetti201 supply and demand? We are talking about people who want basic minimum standards of inclusiveness. Like to be able to get on a bus or a train, or go for a wee when they are out. Not consumer goods

Condescending post- they only wanted to get on a bus which is everyone 's right ffs. Now you're suggesting she gets involved in community transport. You're in lala land

A bus driver refusing to let a parent decide if they can get their child onto a bus cause of elf n safety isn't supply and demand though, it's either cause of over litigiousness or laziness.

It sounds like the driver didn’t realise the ramp wasn’t working.
it may have been working, there may have been a fault, etc I’ve been in multiple buses ( disabilities so unable to drive) where the buses have suddenly developed a fault whilst on the bloody road! Mirrors, the wipers have suddenly stopped working, all the fun time where we had an oil and then a water leak!
none of this sounds like the drivers fault.
people def could have been nicer
hope you did end up having a nice day.

IME inclusion ends at the point where non-disabled people think they are going to be inconvenienced and then it becomes a case of "but it's not fair that you get x, y, and z and I don't" or the ever-popular "but you want equality, this <whatever the shitshow situation is> is equality, the same as the rest of us".

My preference for buses would be that the whole lower deck is fold up seats with bulkheads and support bars placed at regular intervals so that the space can be better utilised for whoever needs it.

Do you think disabled people have loads of idle time in which to do this? Many disabled people work, they run households, they have children, they have busy lives just like you. They are contributors to the public purse you've referenced and even if they weren't that doesn't remove their right to be able to access all of the same services and facilities as non-disabled people.

The problem is with bus services in general, we've had ours reduced from 6 per hour to 2, one on Sundays and evenings, last bus is now 10.45pm, but local city has introduced clean air chargers, put up parking costs etc so driving isn't an option!

If they were more frequent, having a broken ramp or pushchair in the wheelchair space would be less of an issue as another bus would be along in a few minutes whereas if like today for me they are hourly you would be livid!

We need to do better with accessibility of public transport but also more services generally which starts with recruiting lots of new drivers (thousands of vacancies) - I don't understand why the local bus company to me can't partner with the local job centre to recruit!

@Spaghetti201
The select few? It is hardly a “few” people in the UK who use wheelchairs or other mobility aids.
And to make it a “bit more convenient “, as opposed to actually useable for everyone…?
Elderly people often have mobility issues and use public transport frequently- why shouldn’t people have useable accessibility for travel?
Should the select few disabled people stop going out in case the majority of able bodied people get value for their taxes (as if disabled people didn’t contribute to the public purse)?

I push wheelchairs a lot for my job.

I’d have moved the buggy.

It's not the bus companies fault about the other passengers complaining so I don't think you can complain to the bus company about that but definitely complain about the ramp not working. The driver of the 2nd bus should have got the buggy owner to move their buggy.

Where I am I have seen a few times a wheelchair user waiting for a bus. The driver of my bus asks what bus they are waiting for and then radios that in, I assume to allow the driver of that bus to make sure the wheelchair space isn't taken up by buggies when they get to that stop.

Sorry you have to deal with this. Hopefully those impatient passengers are in the minority but I think probably not that much of a minority.

YANBU.
Hopefully the walkers had a long, cold and miserable walk home.

Thanks very much all. Yes there does seem to be a perception that disabled people are showered with benefits and get a whole lot of things for free. There seems to be a real resentment out there based on the (false) perception that they 'have it made'.

Yes we did have a good time when we got there @BewareTheBeardedDragon , thanks for asking.

I really don't think I am a moaner by nature, I just want to have good times and not have these hampered or marred by easily avoidable things. Such as: if a bus's ramp doesn't work it shouldn't be put in service until it is fixed.

I understand what you are saying @Spaghetti201 about there not being unlimited resources. However we are a very wealthy and (we pride ourselves on being) a civilised country. This can never just be about supply and demand as severely disabled people will always be a minority. It is about whether as a country we prioritise the disabled to ensure there are resources for people like my DS to be able to access the world like everyone else.

Are we civilised enough to do this or are we not? This is just the latest of truly dismaying experiences we have had with DS, others have posted above about some of their own - this really makes me have concerns. I want to stress that many people are great and really go out of their way to be helpful; but there are also some dreadful attitudes out there.

And I don't think it can be down to me to organise alternative disability transport. I have a full time job of my own as does DH, so we pay taxes. I don't know whether there are grants available for this but if there is money, why not just put it into the existing infrastructure?

YANBU but I don't understand why the driver couldn't have let the other people on while he tried to sort the ramp.

Presumably he wasn't in the cab while he was trying to sort the ramp, so couldn't take fares.