A propos bus behaviour and children: last week on Jersey, we were on a bus which got full, sitting near the back. Priority seats all occupied by teenagers. An elderly man got on, walked past all the people in priority seats, without being offered a seat (grr on them) or asking for one (grr on him) to where we were sitting, and instructed me to tell Colin to stand so that he could sit down. "I'm 73, me, and how old's he? He should stand."
Now, the route was twisty, the bus wobbling, and there were no holding rails such that a 4yo could reach them - having Colin stand was simply infeasible. I got up myself and gave the man my seat, but not with a very good grace (as it happened, my own back was playing up and standing was no good for me either - but WTF hadn't he asked one of the teens in the priority seats, rather than us?)
I suppose some people who haven't been there don't understand that there is, or can be, a stage where the child is too big to sit on your lap but also not big enough to stand.
Yes, I agree - some people don't understand or have conveniently forgotten. On the Evening News page there are repeated rants from a woman who used to walk from Silverknowes to Princes Street and ALWAYS folded her buggy on the bus. Well, it's great if you can do that, but as always, your mileage may vary.
The thing that narked me was that, at least for the buses we mostly caught when C was using a pushchair - and we had the smallest lightest McLaren there was, which I could actually fold one-handed - there was nowhere in the bus where you could store a folded pushchair. It *just* didn't fit in the ground level luggage place, it was too long to go horizontally in the raised one, and would fall off if one propped it up in the raised place. So in the end, folding even that pushchair only worked well if there was a pair of seats, one for me and C and one for the folded pushchair! Or I could hold it in the aisle and have everyone passing trip over it... We didn't use buses much in those days, after he got too heavy for my back in the sling!
I love the idea of Spores, is it actually rubbish? I am a sling wearing, buggy wielding bus user, though my children have now grown past this point. I always gave way to wheelchairs & elderly people who wanted to sit in the priority seats. That's just what you do, innit?
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Now, the route was twisty, the bus wobbling, and there were no holding rails such that a 4yo could reach them - having Colin stand was simply infeasible. I got up myself and gave the man my seat, but not with a very good grace (as it happened, my own back was playing up and standing was no good for me either - but WTF hadn't he asked one of the teens in the priority seats, rather than us?)
I suppose some people who haven't been there don't understand that there is, or can be, a stage where the child is too big to sit on your lap but also not big enough to stand.
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Yes, I agree - some people don't understand or have conveniently forgotten. On the Evening News page there are repeated rants from a woman who used to walk from Silverknowes to Princes Street and ALWAYS folded her buggy on the bus. Well, it's great if you can do that, but as always, your mileage may vary.
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http://epetitions.scottish.parliament.uk/view_petition.asp?PetitionID=273
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I am a sling wearing, buggy wielding bus user, though my children have now grown past this point. I always gave way to wheelchairs & elderly people who wanted to sit in the priority seats. That's just what you do, innit?
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