to want to use the bus like everyone else?

[toddlertamer20]

Hi,
I'm a single mum of 3, live in london and am now reliant on a wheelchair. I use buses to get around as I don't drive. I'm just getting so sick and tired of people being so incredibly selfish on buses. Wheelchairs have the priority, as obviously we cannot fold, however, as I have found out in the last few years, if there are prams on board and they refuse to fold...there is not much the driver can do as they can't be physically removed.
Most of the time, if a bus comes along with 2 prams, I will wait for the next bus. But sometimes I have to be somewhere and considering that is the only spot I am able to use on the bus, I feel like I should be allowed to use it. Everytime I insist that I need to get on it either a)end up with an argument eith the driver as he won't ask people to move or fold their prams....then a call to TFL who apologise and promise the educate the driver again.
b) I get let on but then the people with the pram won't move and argue with me, one of these times the driver was oblivious that I was mid gangway still and pulled off causing me to be thrown into a pole and break my arm. Or c) They just pull off and don't even attempt to let me on or put the ramp down.
Today again I ended up in a big argument. I needed to get a bus to get my youngest from school. The bus didn't come for ages. It eventually came but 3 buggies were on board, one without a child in it. The driver tried to tell me the next bus would be along in 20 minutes to which I said I couldn't. So he played the announcement asking the people to move their buggies. Then suddenly another passenger comes to the door and informs me that I need to wait as the people with the prams were there first. So I told him that actually by law I have priority, and I need to be on this bus. He then proceeds to tell me how I just need to wait and can't just get on and kick people off. At this point I was late already to get my child from school, so I did insist I got on. In the end I was allowed on bus got a mouthful off both the parents with the prams. I just don't know if it's me. I can understand it's frustrating if you're on a bus and suddenly you have to move or fold your pram up, but I cannot fold my wheelchair. It feels like everyone thinks I am in the wrong when I'm trying my best to just be a normal mother! Please tell me there aren't just selfish people put there...or is this honestly just me?
(by the way I do try to leave super early to make sure I have plenty of time to get there but then I am also waiting outside in the cold and I have problems with my joints so not a good combination)

I don't think anyone now would dare use an umbrella fold for a tiny baby

When my ds was small I had a Maclaren buggy that was suitable from birth and he could lie flat in it. It was perfect. I didn't need to use a bus or train very often, as I drove, but when I did, I could have folded it very easily and it was great if you went into a cafe etc as you could fold it easily if the cafe was busy. The only thing that would make it "unacceptable" now was that my son faced away from me. But presumably there are versions available these days that allow your baby to face you.

Most buggies are enormous these days. I remember being offered a lovely one by a friend of my mum's when pregnant with ds but declined when I realised I'd have to take a wheel off every time I put it in the car boot! I just wouldn't have the patience.

But it should be a legal requirement to use an umbrella buggy on a bus.

They can refuse to move until the entitled parent does as they are told.

They refuse to move in other scenarios, why not this one?

The buggy type is irrelevant.

If you can’t find somewhere for your buggy and your child on a bus without using a wheelchair space, use a taxi, drive a car or get a different bus at a different time.

There is absolutely no excuse for using a wheelchair space other than selfish entitled narcissism. The bus company and the world around you owe you nothing and they certainly do not revolve around you and your baby.

I’ve seen drivers have great success by using peer pressure - stopping the bus until the person folds or moves tends to get the other passengers involved. I know drivers are often concerned with keeping to timetable though.

This is why I believe that parents shouldn’t be allowed on unless buggy is folded. Shame for the ones who do fold/move but the driver can’t tell which is which and far too many would just say “oh yes of course I’ll fold/move” and then when they’re actually asked to, it’s all “yes but Tommy is sleeping/I was here first/my buggy is really large/it’s not safe for me to fold/blah blah blah”.

If some parents are preventing the law from being enforced then they all have to be treated as though they can’t be trusted, sadly. No folded buggy, no bus.

I think reimposing a "folded buggies only" rule would be much too big a punishment for the majority of parents (and again, the ones on the bus are disproportionately poorer women). Most parents don't have lightweight umbrella buggies, and there isn't space to leave them even when you've folded them. You'd be reducing the freedom of hundreds of thousands of poorer women, most of whom are doing no harm whatsoever, because a few of them can't behave. And the mothers with more money would encouraged to drive instead, which is in nobody's interests.

Thats why I'm in favour of a huge training exercise for the drivers and the general public. The peer pressure approach works best if all the bystanders know the rules before you start, and aren't second guessing the drivers' call.

You need to wear a go-pro body camera and start filming what is happening. It's amazing that people think that you don't have priority over buggies.

The signs are on all the buses too.

I'm sad that more people don't stick up for you too.

@FunnyItWorkedLastTime The problem with a training exercise is indicated by this thread - many people know what the rules are, but they disagree with them. I think peer pressure only works because people want to get where they’re going, not because they agree with what the rules are.

I do accept that the folding rule is really harsh but realistically all of these women who can’t fold or make appropriate space are going to have to leave the bus if a wheelchair user gets on, aren’t they? So the “disadvantage” to them still exists.

Having the benefit of using the bus freely with buggy unfolded for 19 journeys out of twenty (a rough estimate based on my considerable experience) seems like a fair exchange.

I'm not convinced that the average bus passenger who doesn't have a wheelchair or a pushchair does know what the rules are. Making sure that absolutely everyone on the bus is clear on the rules would surely help when you get a bolshy pram wielder.

Thing with a pram is they're like cars from what I can see. I never used one, but had one kid, never driven, and soon as I realised getting on the bus with a buggy was a hassle I switched to my sling for outdoor, and forgot the buggy.

But these people have the kitchen sink under there. Often there's two babies in them. It's not practical to fold.

I would often use my buggy a as a shopping cart too. Given I don't drive, so save a lot of emissions, and lug masses of shopping on the buggy, which literally relies on the baby's weight to keep it from toppling, I feel I have the same right as you, although obviously you didn't choose to be a WC user, I chose to be a parent (well there's an argument there, but that's a whole other conversation)

My options are then drive? More emissions, or cab it, I was quite poor, or don't do a big shop which I deserved to be able to do. Okay I could to it late which I sometimes did but still.

My point is I think these pram pushers have as much right as they're using public transport and transporting many things and like what's the alternative? They need to heavily modify their lives to accommodate someone who is equal to them.

So I'm thinking they have as much right to be fair.

Why aren't people who think they have as much right as a buggy user to use the wheelchair space lobbying for better access / more space / better design?

The reason most umbrella fold buggies are 6m+ is because of positional asphyxia - the back of the buggy isn’t rigid enough to support babies neck to prevent slouching. It’s difficult to get adequate harness support on a small baby too - especially a slim baby. You are also not supposed to use hoods or blankets to prevent suffocation, so keeping a baby sufficiently warm in an umbrella fold buggy is difficult.

There are some foldable buggies which are suitable from birth, but these tend to be the more expensive models. And there are not many of them.

@theoldcatsmells Its really sad that you are unable to understand why someone who uses a wheelchair should have priority over a healthy adult with a pushchair. Suggesting that the OP should use a car or taxi is an unbelievably crass and unkind thing to do.

Thankfully the bus companies have no choice but to prioritise wheelchair users if they don't want to face prosecution.

I'm amazed at some people responses on this thread tbh.

Why should they have as much right as wheelchair users to use the wheelchair space which wheelchair users campaigned for years to get? Wheelchair users users are not equal to parents for very obvious reasons.

If, as parent of a baby, you can't drive, walk or use a cab, you are still free to use a bus and use the wheelchair space provided that someone in a wheelchair doesn't need it. If they do, your option if you cannot fold the pushchair is to get off the bus. It won't happen often, and it'll be a problem for quite a short time. The wheelchair user generally has the problem for ever.

Don’t most buses have separate spaces for pushchairs and wheelchairs anyway?

Ours takes two pushchairs on the left of this image, and a wheelchair space on the right.

commons.m.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Inside_First_67600_(Enviro300_SN53KKY).JPG

I never understand why anyone puts their kid in a school they need to rely on a bus to get them to, but especially if you're fighting to actually get on the bus when it does arrive like you are. Is there not a closer school they could go to? Not that you should have to move them, I'm just genuinely curious why you don't have them in a closer school

I know the Op has answered this comment, but felt I had to make my own - I'm on Mumsnet a lot and have been for many years and this comment takes the absolute biscuit for insensitivity and poor thinking through. You do realise that for many parents, there is no choice in the school your child is allocated. And if that allocated school requires a bus trip to drop-off and collect that is what the parent has to do.

See, this is perfectly reasonable. What is unreasonable is the several posters who have suggested that pushchairs are charged £10 to board each bus, or that pushchair users should be forced to dismantle/fold their pushchair, regardless of how the space should be used. This is particularly problematic as usually the wheelchair space is also the standing space, so if we use the logic that pushchairs aren’t allowed to use that space, then we would also need to ensure that no standing passengers use that space, no?

But it's a wheelchair spot? It was put there for wheelchairs...When I do a big shop, I have to get my older kids to carry it or do the shop online.
I do wonder sometimes if there was a special 'parents with pram' spot that people campaigned for for years, Joe these pram pushers would react if several wheelchair users camped out in it and refused to move. I also chose to be a parent, I had the same challenges on buses.

Not in London, where the op lives.

I would 100% support buggies having to be folded before getting on the bus

Ftr, I don't drive, I live in London and I have 2 children close in age, who I had to take around on public transport.

That wasn't suggested. It was said that the alternative to using a buggie was to use a taxi because the shopping is being done in bulk instead of using a taxi which is unaffordable.

So then where does priority lie? The person using the buggie in this way should do the shopping later at night or something?

Why would they when they can steal the hard won rights of disabled people?

What's your arrangement for bulk shops?

Mine's now cab home from local supermarket, which thankfully is an Aldi, but while baby was small it was buggie with baby as weight and bus.

"So I'm thinking they have as much right to be fair."

Dozens of posters have told you already - it's a wheelchair space.
What else do you think people should be able to take that are not their's? Blue badge spaces? Other people's houses?

So then where does priority lie? The person using the buggie in this way should do the shopping later at night or something?

Why do you think amount of shopping has any relevance whatsoever? It’s a wheelchair space. Wheelchairs have priority. Even if little Tommy is sleeping, mum has loads of shopping, mum has a buggy the size of Brazil, it’s late, mum’s been waiting an hour and even if all of the above are true. Wheelchairs have priority.

This kind of nonsense whatabouttery is why I argue for folding or you don’t get on the bus.

Thankfully what you are thinking is utterly irrelevant @theoldcatsmells.