Buggies and Wheel users users

That is quite disgraceful CEE after all the folk didn't ask to have twins , same as the disable didn't ask to be disabled .

I repeat, it should be first come first served. I f people are inconvienced well that is life . get on with it.

More fold up seats is a great idea. And smaller, more easily foldable buggies- some of them are ridiculous . Where I live, last buses can be very early 5-6pm and lots of taxis ard not wheelchair accessible. As a pp said, there would not be space for buggies if disabled people hadn't fought for wheelchair spaces. Good on that couple who got off without a word

The spaces on buses are provided for wheelchair users as a result of their hard fought campaign for greater access to public transport for disabled people. People with children in buggies are benefitting from this, which is fine but they should not have priority over wheelchair users who have no other choice. I agree it could be difficult if someone with a buggy is already on the bus, and this requires some compromise and tolerance from both sides. However to me it's the same as an able bodied person sitting in a seat on a bus or train that has a sign indicating that it must be vacated if someone with a disability needs it. It's a chance you take if you decide to use it. I do agree that more spaces should be made available in the longer term.

I was on a bus several years ago when a young couple with a twin buggy and one other small child were asked to leave the bus because a wheelchair user wanted to get on. They left the bus without a word, I could not believe what I was seeing! I think that was wrong, why couldn't the wheelchair user wait for the next bus they were running every 10 minutes but coward that I am I never said a word and neither did anyone else.

Good idea to have more fold up seats MiniMouse, I also used to carry all the shopping in, under and on the pram.. the only place to put a pushchair was in the gap under the stairs in those days and the conductors were GOD! If they said no room for a pushchair then off you got..

I think you're right tanith I did the same as you. I used to put the whole weekly shopping on/under/around the pushchair, too! I'm sure they must still make buggies that fold up easily.

After all, a wheelchair user has no choice about folding the wheelchair up and for them there may be no other option than catching a bus.

More seats on the bus that fold up out of the way to allow more access to push/wheelchairs would seem a sensible way of helping the situation.

Maybe Mums who need to travel on buses could perhaps buy a pushchair that does fold up when needs be.. I was never allowed to take a pushchair on a bus (they weren't nearly so light or foldable) when my kids were small we walked everywhere pushing the pram with a baby inside and a toddler on the seat.

Hear, hear vegasmags!

I think that part of the problem here is that pushchairs and buggies do not seem to fold up very easily these days and so do take up quite a bit of room even when folded. Recently, on a visit to London to see my daughter, we had to take her unwell baby to the GP, which is quite a bus ride away - she does not own a car. London bus drivers will not accept more than 2 pushchairs and in fairness there isn't really room for more, but we had to let 3 buses go past as they were up to their pushchair limit, leaving us no option but to take an expensive taxi in order to keep the appointment. Rather than debating about whose rights are the most important, maybe new buses should be designed with more standing room downstairs so that both wheelchair and pushchair owners can be accommodated more easily. On the Manchester metro, there are large areas left for standing passengers, and I have never seen a problem with either wheelchair or pushchair users.

This was a case about a bus company who refused to give a wheelchair user priority over a woman with a baby in a buggy. The wheelchair user won the case, then lost it at appeal.

I see your point, kitty, but as the woman with the buggy was already on the bus, the driver could hardly chuck her off when someone in a wheelchair wanted to get on a few stops later. Then she would have sued, no doubt...

Nonu, babies can be taken out of the buggy and the buggy folded down. Or the mother can perhaps walk, pushing the buggy. Or, just for a little while, shop online.

The only wheelchair users I would object to being given priority, are the ones who are in the wheelchairs simply because they are fat.

Wheelchair users have no choice in whether they use a wheelchair or not. Mothers and babies do!