Was I Unreasonable - wheelchair Space

[Nicetomeetyou25]

Hi, My DC ( 10 ) is a wheelchair user, we have to take public transport to school and honestly where we live is a nightmare. Some of the London buses still have a very small area where wheelchairs and pushchairs can go. I know else where there is no priority but on London buses it is stated very clearly wheelchairs are priority and pushchair need to be prepared to fold. School runs can be crazy because there tends to be a lot of pushchairs. I never ask a pushchair to get off and always wait for a bus that we can fit on. Every day a particular school mum beats me to the bus stop and she really does make sure she stands in the correct place to get on first and I usually allow this.

yesterday I could not be late home so I collected DC a tiny bit early and took them to the bus stop before the school bus stop. Got on bus and we arrived at the bus stop with usual pram getting on ( I should have added that she has a double stroller )

I had placed DC in the correct wheelchair position so sideways with back against the wall where stairs are as it is how the buses even say you have to.
she asks me to turn DC around so there was more space for her to get in side by side. I refused. She said she didn’t understand why I wouldn’t. I explained that I wasn’t willing to change position as it wasn’t safe.
She goes to bus driver and kicks off to advice him that there was enough space of I just turned the wheelchair around and placed it behind the pole.
she got off in a bit of a strop and called me selfish.
was I being unreasonable ?

I semi agree with you . I'm very much on the fence . There is an assumption a mum with twins/2 non walkers can fold their buggy. Use a sling etc in my case I was able to use a double sling, mix of double pushchair, single sling/single buggy . Just because I could does not mean others can. Theses mums who are expected to get off the bus or fold even if they can't fold could be on their way to a hospital appointment that she's waited 2 years for and to bottom of list if she misses that appointment.

We are also making an assumption that them children in pushchairs don't have special needs my grandson has special needs whilst he was able to fit in a normal buggy that's what was used. Now he has a disability buggy . We will still be expected to fold because it looks similar to a normal buggy.

Majority of people probably could fold but there are some who have good reason they can't.

What really gets my back up is empty pushchairs in the space

A SN buggy or normal buggy used instead of a wheelchair are treated as a wheelchair and have the same priority as a wheelchair with no expectation it is folded. That obviously wasn’t the case in the OP otherwise, as I said in a pp, the mother would a) have said so, and b) mostly likely have had a sign/sticker saying the buggy is to be treated as a wheelchair.

The mother going to the hospital in your made up scenario should do whatever she would do if there was already someone in that space. They could for example, allow enough time to wait for a later bus (if I had waited that long for an appointment I wouldn’t run the risk of missing it), get a taxi/lift, fold the buggy…

That's the thing though disability does not always show so mum would be exspected to fold as people assume no special needs due to it being a normal pushchair.

Same can be said about the wheel chair user. Leave yourself plenty of time etc etc

I was not really talking about op in this case . I was talking in general terms . Op went to the bus before the person with the buggy.

Another thing I have seen . Is bus drivers pass disabled people at bus stops. Don't even ask people if they can fold .

I personally would always make space for someone who needs it more than me

You can get “please treat as a wheelchair” signs for buggies/sn buggies if disabilities are involved, and the parents can explain to the driver/wheelchair user the situation.

they should also get priority over other pushchair users

Nowhere did I say all disabilities are visible! I am more than aware they aren’t. If someone is using a SN buggy or normal buggy as a wheelchair their parent/carer can say so and the buggy can have a sign/sticker saying so as I posted.

All the wheelchair/SN buggy users I know do leave plenty of time or take taxi’s/car/hospital transport. But the space is a wheelchair space, not a buggy space and therefore a wheelchair/SN buggy/normal buggy used as a wheelchair takes priority over a buggy whatever the reason.

Yes I know this now . Bit did not until a couple of weeks ago.

When DC we had a disabled stroller, I applied for a blue badge and they also have access passes now. If I was in a spot and was asked to move I would show that. People always go well why should I have to prove it but well it never bothered me and they seem to have no issue doing it to claim carer But tickets / access to rides like you have to.

She could fold the pushchair and take the child out but your DS relies upon the wheelchair, so no YANBU at all.

You wouldn't use any of the arguments above for Blue Badge parking. "Oh, I have to park here, because.......
If you regard parking in a Blue Badge space is OK because no disabled person is using it you are breaking the law. The same applies to the wheelchair space.
It's there for wheelchair users and although, unlike parking it's acceptable for other use UNTIL it's needed for a wheelchair.
That is the law. Whether you like it or not.

Might be an unpopular opinion but I don’t agree that wheelchair users should get priority. If someone is already occupying the space with a buggy and they are unable to move it or fold it down (which can often be the case when you’re travelling with multiple children, bags etc) then I think the wheelchair user should have to wait for the next bus.

Well @SEMPA1234567 you can think that. But you're categorically wrong in both legal and moral terms.

It's not just an "unpopular opinion" - if you required wheelchair users to wait for the ext bus, you would be acting illegally.

I don't know how people like you live with yourself having such an ableist discriminatory view of fellow citizens.

There's a thread going right now by a poster who wants to park in blue badge spaces when all the p&c ones are full. Some people are just entitled shits.

Yanbu at all. I've been in this situation many times before dh started working from home and doing the school runs in the car.

Actually @MobilityCat a lot of non-Blue Badge holders do appear to be able to justify parking in disabled spaces on the basis of ‘only being two minutes’ etc.

Emma, that's true and it just reinforces the fact that people can be selfish inconsiderate and anti social. Even mothers.

Our local Tesco has bays that are for disabled & P&C. Both labels are on the car parking space

Last week there was a thread full of people trying to justify using blue badge spaces because they had twisted their ankle or whatever. Even with a system that should have a clear can and can’t use people
find a way around it

You would compromise your child’s safety to let someone else catch the bus? Not sure I would admit that.

@hryllilegur I was waiting for someone to bring up equity! It’s a lovely picture and I fully understand the point but the bus scenario is more like if the 2nd picture only had the wheelchair user and the ramp as the adult and child had been made to move out the way completely! But they can wait and watch another match. Some would say that’s fair as it’s the only way the wheelchair user can watch the game and they get priority, I just don’t agree.

No. You are forgetting that the buggy folds down. The adult can hold their child, fold it down, put it in the luggage compartment and sit down with the child. Or they can choose to get off and wait for the next bus if they prefer not to have to do that.

The wheelchair user has no other choice. They can only access the bus in that particular space.

Years ago buses were not accessible. Parents all held their children and folded down their buggies. They managed this with shopping and everything. Yes, it was shit. But you got on with it. And your kids got bigger and it got easier. Other people helped too.

Wheelchair users couldn’t use the bus at all. So disability campaigners fought hard and buses became wheelchair accessible. Specific spaces were created for wheelchair users.

As a courtesy, bus companies allowed parents to use these spaces with their buggies when they weren’t needed for their intended purpose.

But parents started buying ever more enormous prams that they couldn’t fold down. They stopped organising their stuff so that they could put it in the luggage rack next to a folded down buggy. They started feeling that the wheelchair space really was their space and that it is unacceptable that anyone might expect them to fold their buggy down (or get off the bus because doing so was too difficult for them).

And here you are insisting that your wants as a parent who has bought a buggy they can’t fold down while dealing with their child or can’t easily empty the shopping basket (which is also enormous) to fold it down are equal to the wheelchair user who is legally entitled to use the bloody space that was provided to give them access to bus travel at all.

Parents of young children are not excluded from the bus. Even if they’ve made choices that mean they will elect to get off the bus rather than fold their buggy down. The wheelchair user they won’t move to accommodate is excluded

Basically they saw the ramp, decided that looked easier, stopped buying the equipment that would let them stand on
the two boxes and now feel their need for the ramp is entirely equivalent to the wheelchair user.

It's quite plain, if you have a blue badge it is only valid for the person who is registered.
You cannot park in the bay if the badge is not displayed or if the named person is not present at the time.

There are a couple of instances where this isn’t true. In Haringey for example, in some car parks they have moved to a virtual blue badge so the blue badge itself doesn’t need to be displayed. And the blue badge holder doesn’t have to be present at the time of parking if you are picking them up.

As I am using my wheelchair to collect food, I need to use a bus. Quite often there's one or more buggy jockeys occupying the wheelchair space, and usually they refuse to move.

I've previously been denied access to the bus by the driver, saying that they won't move. I told him that he has two choices, stop the bus until they move and the other is call the police to move them.

He said that he will call the police and make me wait for the next bus, so I told him that S24 of the Public Passenger Vehicle Act 1981 states:

Bus drivers refusing to alloww heelchair users onto buses where the wheelchair space is either unoccupied or occupied by people who can readily and reasonably move are committing a crime. They can be prosecuted, given a £500 fine and 3 penalty points.

He stopped the bus until they moved and dropped the ramp for me.

I really despair about how selfish some people can be, including that bus driver who just wanted an easy life.

I'm glad you knew your rights because I also expect many others don't. It's still awful that you had to cite the law just to get people to do the right bloody thing!

@MobilityCat as the parent of a child with a severe disability (blind), you are my heroine, but it’s fecking exhausting fighting for our rights constantly. One day, I swear, I’m going to turn like Michael Douglas in the film Falling Down and shoot every fucker parking in a Blue Badge space for ‘two minutes’, every fucker occupying a wheelchair space on a bus with a pram (I also have a non-blind younger child and I can do folding down), every fucker jumping over my DD’s long white cane to walk up the street a nano second faster, every fucker refusing to budge out of the way for a blind child walking with a white cane, every fucker barging in front of my blind child who walks with a white cane as she tries to access a bus, every fucker who pushes from behind as my blind child who walks with a cane tries to navigate the steep step between platform and train at our big city train station. I might just take out your bus driver, too. 😅

No doubt, I’m now on some Prevent Terrorism list! And I’ll probably be banned from MN!

You were in the right.

Hi Emma! Wow, I thought I had some bad days, but reading about your child's experiences really saddened me. I'm so sorry that you, together with her face such selfish behaviour from people.
I sometimes wonder if we're going to end up wearing a sign saying "Unclean, unclean!" and ringing a bell like lepers used to. I have a blind friend and when she crosses a road, random guys offer to "help her across" while groping her.