Dirty looks at people with scooters? Who ARE these people?????? I can't even fathom the idea of being angry because a person with disabilities needs to be loaded onto a bus. That boggles my mind that people would be that small and petty.
People are though.
We have heard some of those comments directed toward my DD. She is permanently disabled because of cerebral palsy. She has never walked unassisted and never will without using a gait trainer (which is basically a very expensive and large walker that holds the person up so that they can walk in a 'frame' that totally holds them up.
Does this exempt us from hearing the comments of small and petty people?
You would hope so, but the answer is no.
Even though people say they would never complain about someone who is 'truly disabled' and are only talking about the 'cheaters' or 'fakers', somehow people do think they can tell the difference. Just because someone can walk or is out of the
ECV/wheelchair for a while, a lot of people seem to think that means they are not 'truly disabled' and are fair game for comments.
When DD has taken a break from sitting in her wheelchair and sat on a bench, we have heard people going by saying "look at that girl on the bench, she's one of those wheelchair cheaters. Bet she just got it to go ahead in lines " (loud enough for us to hear, since that apparently was the point).
People make the same kind of comments on the bus.
"Why does
she get to get on first"......
"It's not fair. We had to wait in the rain while they got
her on" (depsite the fact that my DD had to wait in the rain in an area without a roof while they waited under the roofed area)........
"It's not fair.
She takes up 3 seats with that wheelchair. That's 3 more people who could have sat" (despite the fact that we were at the bus stop before they were and would have all gotten seats at any rate, plus DH and I were standing, so we
didn't take up any more seats than we would have if all of us had waited in the 'regular' line and been able to walk on.
My DD owns 2 expensive custom wheelchairs (power and manual) -
each of them costing over $5000, a gait trainer that has a catalog price of around $2700 AND a computerized communication device costing almost $7000 because she can't speak.
Just because she can be lifted out of her wheelchair and placed onto a bench in the park does not mean that she is not disabled.
Just how much more disabled does someone have to be before people leave us alone?
I have a hidden disability that can be a problem when I walk or stand too much, like at WDW. I had reserved a scooter from an off site company, but after reading all the "issues" of bus drivers treating users unfairly, people complaining about scooter drivers, and how some drivers are treated as 2nd class citizens, I decided to cancel my scooter and just deal with my problem by taking alot of breaks and pain relievers. I don't need my 7 yo GS to see people treat me as a problem. I ended up purchasing a special stool that is easy to carry and I will be able to sit wherever I am, to help relieve my pain.
I am not too proud to use a scooter, it just sounds like too much of a hassle to deal with. If my pain becomes too much to deal with, then I will rent one from the park for that day and explain to my GS about how people might treat me because of it. I won't have to deal with the bus issues.
You are exactly the kind of person that the 'gripers' hurt.
My FIL needed a scooter about 10 years before he would actually rent one for the first time. He had bad knees and hips and his doctor had been talking to him for a while about getting his knees replaced.
My FIL and MIL came with us on an annual trip to WDW and over that time period, we gradually saw them doing less and less in the parks.
They were limited by how far the benches were apart and what was within 'walking distance' of the train at MK or the Friendship Boats at Epcot. He ended each park day in pain, taking pain medication and with ice packs on his knees.
The first year he rented an ECV at Epcot was the first year in many where he did not end the trip in extreme pain. He never agreed to rent from off-site (he had been on a few too many bus trips with us to want to load an ECV on the bus).
He died suddenly about 5 years after he started renting
ECVs. We had some good trips with him when he used one for mobility, but I feel sad for the time we (and our DDs) lost with Grandpa at the parks in the years before he rented one.
And incidently, scooters do not necessarily get automatic first entry on a bus, as one said sometimes they are too full to load a scooter. In one instance it took 2 hours and bus after bus for one to load my mom's scooter. Two hours in which the drivers were notified that a scooter needed to be loaded and in which they loaded all the able bodied people first until there was no more room for the scooter and we were waiting at the bus stop for the very first one in the AM that day at CBR. So I have to say I don't have a lot of sympathy for those who complain that they have to wait a few minutes to get on a bus.
Some of the drivers don't
want to load a scooter, so they will either say the bus is too full or ignore the person on the scooter until the bus
is to full to safely load the scooter. This is completely wrong (besides being against the law).
They do it because they know that none of the other passengers are likely to complain about it and the family with the scooter is likely to feel unsure and not want to bother anyone. So, the people with the scooter are unlikely to complain.
eeyorethegreat said:
We did see a couple incidents of people who were trading turns on their rented scooter. It makes me sad to see these people who are essentially too lazy to realize how lucky they are to have health and mobility.
Because scooters are expensive, many people who both have disabilities/mobility problems
do rent one scooter and share use of it.
It's also better for people to get up and walk around for a while rather than sitting and riding all day - changing positions and walking for a while helps to prevent muscle cramps and DVTs (blood clots, which can be deadly).
In some of those cases, an able-bodied person
might ride the ECV for a while to give the driver a break.
eeyorethegreat said:
I've also saw a couple incidents where the scooter driver obviously felt they had the right of way regardless of who was ahead of them. One woman actually drove her scooter into my mom's intentially all the while yelling for her to get out of the way (would have been easier to drive around my Mom) and once getting past us ran into the people walking ahead of us. So yes there are some who ride scooters who don't need to and those who do need to but are inconsiderate- I imagine those people are inconsiderate in and out of the scooter.
That is quite true and the rude scooter drivers are the only 'true' abusers on this thread.
I understand that many ailments are not visible and I do not question people using scooters. My only complaint is the number of family members allowed to board the bus. While waiting for a bus after the closing of MK a bus pulled up about the same time as a large group with one person on a scooter. They ALL boarded the bus -- there must have been 15 of them!! They were mostly adults and I feel that they abused the sytem. A family should get to ride together but not an extended family or group. There was ALOT of grumbling and complaining in that line.
The WDW 'standard' for number of people in a wheelchair or ECV 'party' is 6 (5 plus the person with the disability)
1) I felt bad about getting a scooter because I felt like I really didnt NEED it like others do. There are other people out there that really need the mobility help so I felt a bit guilty when i was given special treatment. Not once did I accept a fastpass esk entrance but instead parked the scooter and stood in line like the rest of the folks. Of course that much alone killed my toes and foot but at least I didnt have to walk on it from place to place all over those major parks.
If you had stayed in the scooter, you would have found that in most cases, you would be waiting in the regular line, the same as other guests.
All the lines at AK and the Studio are Mainstream Lines - which means they are wheelchair accessible.
MK and Epcot are older parks and have some lines that are not accessible, but most attractions have had Mainstream Lines added as they were renovated if at all possible. Some lines are wheelchair accessible, but not ECV accessible. Those attractions have wheelchairs someone using an ECV can switch to so they still use the Mainstream Line.
Some attractions have a separate entrance or a 'pull off' point where people using ECVs or wheelchairs are pulled out of the regular line. Those 'pull-off' points are usually quite close to the regular boarding area and are needed because something about the regular boarding area is not accessible
or the boarding and exit are in very different places.
There are often 'disadvantages' to using those boarding areas that able bodied people don't see.
For example, wheelchair/ECV users miss the stretching room at the Haunted Mansion and on our trip in April 2008, we waited for 25 minutes in the handicapped boarding area for Small World when people who could walk on were getting loaded as quickly as they could walk in. Some boats were sent out half full because people didn't walk fast enough. We had to watch that for 25 minutes, which is not much fun.
2) People really DONT see scooter riders. I had people bump in to me, nearly sit on my lap, jump in front of me, etc etc. I never got mad but it sure is frustration
My DD has had people almost sit in her lap when they were taking pictures and backing up to get everyone framed in their camera viewfinder. Some never even realized they came :thatclose: to sitting on DD and almost none apologize.
if they really don't need it but I really can't see anyone enjoying having people staring at them, trying to figure out whether or not they are telling the truth.
