To think Simon Hoggart could have got up and helped this "fraught and harrassed looking woman" instead of just feeling sorry for her.

[bumpyboo]

This is what Simon Hoggart wrote in Saturdays' Guardian.

"Baby buggies seem to get steadily bigger, so that if you're behind two mums having a chat, it's like being blocked on a motorway while one gigantic truck edges past another at a total speed of half a mile an hour.

The other day two of these vast things, like scaled-down SUVs, were wheeled on to a packed bus I was in. The first juggernaut occupied all the space provided for strollers, so the other had to block the whole aisle, making it impossible for other passengers to move.

That mother looked fraught and harassed, and I felt sorry for her, but it didn't occur to either of them to get off and wait for a less crowded bus"

Err maybe you could have got up and helped her fold the buggy Simon?
I've sometimes waited for ages in London for a bus with space for a buggy so when one comes you usually have to get on it and when you've got a baby its pretty hard to fold the thing up and hold the baby as well especially on a crowded moving bus.
Here's the link if anyone wants to look.

www.guardian.co.uk/theguardian/2010/feb/06/climate-change-simon-hoggarts-week

these huge buggies manage to take up as much space folded as when up.

and you need to spend several days studying the things to work out how to put the brakes on never mind fold them. how exactly could he have helped her?

Well perhaps he could have offered to hold the baby while she folded the buggy up. I have been asked by Mums to hold theirs before. Also I think most folded buggies would probably fit in the luggage rack up front. I just think if hes that bugged by it he could have done something at the time.

I do agree about the buggies!

I had a small umbrella fold Maclaren (as almost everyone had when mine were small - up to about 5 years ago) but buggies are now massive and ££££ and I'm glad I never had one.

I have a MacLaren Major now as dd2 is disabled - and have had mums of these mega buggies ask me to fold up cos they need the space more than my disabled dd2. Cos I would still be pushing a big buggy (which incidentally folds down much smaller than theirs) if I didn't have to!

It's horrible knowing that you're taking up loads of space on a bus, and people are tutting because you're blocking the aisle.

It almost certainly would be easier and more considerate to other passangers if you got off and tried to catch the next one, but it's sometimes not practical if you're in a rush. Especially when you've waited for ages and if there is only one other buggy on there (as the space is meant to fit two buggies)....

But.... If you travel on public transport you aren't entitled to special treatment which allows you to take up huge amounts of space and block the aisle just because you've got a baby.

Why should people be tolerant of having to clamber over you and all your gumph? No reason why they should be wrestling with your pram to fold it down for you either. You can put a baby in a Mclaren from three months and they're a piece of piss on the tube or bus.

Certain prams are clearly impractical on busses - my first one often had to go on through the back doors as it was too wide to fit through the aisle on some busses. It was an absolute monster and I'm sure plenty of people were cursing me.

And why not? They paid a fare to travel, and I made their journey more uncomfortable than it needed to be simply because I made a consumer choice to buy an enormous beast of a pram in the knowledge that I'd be getting public transport, which was pretty selfish of me.

It would be really nice if everyone was tolerant and understanding of everyone else and tried to help where they could, but the expectation that this should happen when you've chosen to buy a big pram is a bit much I think. You just have to weather the tuts and sighs with good grace and remember that they won't be babies forever.

Are buggies really that much bigger than they used to be or is it just that the wheels look more chunky? Surely they are not bigger now than in the old silver cross pram days?

this makes me so cross and its just typically british I think.

In france, for example I've been rushed to the front of the queue in all sorts of sits when pregnant, and help given with buggy and baby.

only in britain are we expected to conduct ourselves like some kind of second class citizens and apologise for our and our babies' existence.

I hate those big buggies as much as anyone, and of course they're not designed to go on a crowded bus but who knows what was going on with those women? perhaps one had a nifty little fold up but she'd left it at a friends house, etc etc.

come on Simon et all, have a little humanity. she's having less fun than you, I assure you. would he have felt able to be as flippant about two wheelchair users on board at once. everyone SHOULD have the right to travel by public transport.

Good points notanumber. I think though its just the tone of the article that gets me a bit. That he saw she looked fraught but didn't offer help and then judged her in the newspaper.

Buggies are smaller than in the Silver Cross days but larger (and harder to fold) than even 5-10 years ago.

And expensive!! I spent £60 on my basic umbrella fold lie back Maclaren - which was the only buggy I had for 3 kids. My kids are 6, 8, 10. I steer well clear (have hidden!) the pram threads on here - there are some very very weird people there!

But in between the era of Silver Cross and today's SUV buggies was a golden age of 2CV and mini cooper equivalents.

I'm convinced they've quadrupled in size and weight. I work in London and am always happy to help lift buggies up and down tube steps, but I draw the line at the SUV types - they are just too big and too heavy. I leave 'em to the big blokes I'm afraid.

I have 6 month old twins and a toddler, I dont drive so walk everywhere but sometimes I need to get the bus (in a rush, raining etc) my buggy is rather large but I havent really got much choice

I do try and walk as much as possible to avoid such problems but I think that sometimes other bus passengers need to be more accomadating to mothers, we dont want to be in the way as much as you dont want us in the way!

A lot of the time folding the buggy just isn't a useful option- sleeping baby, buggy laden with shopping etc- and the situation here is that if you see a buggy- enabled bus you get on it! The next bus is probably going to be a smelly old double decker with high narrow steps.
I still use the buggy for town trips with my 3yo and get the bus back, but if another mum with a baby is queueing up I will fold ours down.

what a whinger - s* happens, sometimes it's a couple of little old ladies with their wheelie bags blocking the aisle, deal with it.

I knew I'd be using a lot of buses so used a MacLaren from birth but you can't really get outraged over the fact some buggies are bigger, and that their owners want to take the bus once in a while. If they weren't on the bus, someone would be bitching about mums clogging the roads by taking their offspring by car into London.

Grungeblob I think you are right but I've just been looking for proof on the net but can't find any pics.
My old pram was so huge ( had it given by family) I could hardly get it on the bus even if there was space so in reality I ended up hardly ever going very far from home

I agree with him. Buggies don't need to be massive, and it causes hassle for others when there isn't enough space for them.

I wouldn't offer help to anybody who didn't ask for it - have read far too many threads here where people take grave offence at being judged/ insulted/ their children interfered with etc if you even look at them on a bus, never mind comment on their situation or offer help.

Like most people, Hoggart probably looks away, says nowt etc because mothers get very feisty when strangers talk to them or look as if they're going to move towards their child.

If he had have offered to hold the baby while she folded the pram there would have been another thread about that instead..

LOL

Was Simon Hoggart unreasonable to hold my baby?!

Love it.

I have to say I must live is a fantastic bus area because I have never had nothing but smiles and help on the bus!. I had a loola at first but after 6 months I used a quinny zapp so it folds really small BUT I cant do it one handed so i have always had to ask someone to hold the baby. The best people to ask in my experience are teenagers and younger people older people look nervous if you ask them and more middle aged people tend to look a bit put out (huge generalization I know!).
I dont understand why anyone would buy a HUGE pram or pushchair but most fit easily into buses with buggy spaces so I dont see what the writers probelm is really!.

I'm all for not criticing other mothers etc., and I try not to most of the time, but I do actually think it's a bit ridiculous for people who live in London, and therefore are very likely to be using the tube/bus/crowded streets, not to take this into account when buying their buggy. I coped perfectly fine with a Maclaren and sling from birth and genuinely do not understand why other friends who had very similar day to day life to me (i.e. on bus/tube quite often) needed some monster 3 wheeler and then got shirty when people tutted on the bus or didn't help lift it down the stairs. An acquaintance expected sympathy from me when she put her huge pram on the bus and got tutted at because it blocked the aisle - and her baby wasn't even in it because she had her in a sling as she actually preferred to carry her that way and the pram was just in case her back hurt!!!

But these women he writes about may have been from out of town, or between Maclarens, or just new to London so I'm not judging them per se

Having said that Simon Hoggart could have offered to help hold the baby while they folded the buggy down, but that would have ruined his story wouldn't it?

I think the point of his story was how needlessly big buggies have got.

He was just observing.

And good luck to any middle aged man on his own offering to hold people's babies. My dad gets weird looks for taking his own grandson to the park.

Funny enough my kids all developed perfectly normally in a forward facing Maclaren, but there you go.

I'm amazed at how much things have changed in 4 years or so since I last used a baby buggy.

Dealing with the issues that arise from pushing around a 6year old in a Major, I can tell you that they are waaay more than a big baby issue. And as I already said, I am constantly amazed at the entitlement mothers with big babies (who can walk) with big buggies seem to feel over my dd2 in a "wheelchair" buggy - who can't.

I suppose most of the time I have been pushing a baby, talking to them was low priority as I was so busy with 1 or 2 toddlers ......

Would be interested to know if people do think I have the ultimate large buggy for my dd. Or why they don't realise she must have a physical disability when she is sitting in the buggy in her school uniforem with her schoolbag on her knee, often as not reading her reading book!

I think Simon Hoggart just spends his time being offensive to anyone who isn't a middle aged man who completely agrees with him. I hate the way he takes the piss out of round robins, too, yes, sure, some of them are silly, but he specialises in laughing at other people - I'm sure he does stupid stuff too.