Tesco - Parent/Child + disabled car spaces

minnie123

dizziblonde wrote: »

No I have a problem with having to essentially manouver my way through a children's playground when I'm trying to get in and out of the hell that is supermarket shopping as quickly as possible. Add the delightful slope that supermarkets love to put just outside their doors to make steering that fully-laden trolley just that little bit more challenging and you've got a recipe for disaster that's going to see a kid running into a trolley one day - and the easy steer smaller capacity trolleys have the bottom of their load compartment just at the level of a child's head height... I can see the accident coming, and I can see whoever is unlucky enough to be pushing the trolley at the time being given a tonne of grief - and I really dislike it as they are so incredibly near moving cars and it only takes one to dart a tiny bit off the road (and they do on a regular basis as their parents are distracted) and again - there's another accident waiting to happen.

I don't like children being minimally supervised in an area with a high amount of car and foot traffic, where people are pushing around nice heavy metal trolleys at child height and they're ruuning around full-pelt doing the typical kid thing of not properly concentrating on where they're going... does that make me have a problem with kids that I can see the potential for some pretty ikky accidents?

I don't in any way shape or form have a problem with kids, I work with them most days (apart from when I fancy a day off), I do have a problem with them being allowed to run wild in spaces where it's not appropriate or safe for them to do so - and a crowded supermarket exit area/car park is not an appropriate area. These kids are running around full-pelt out there, and anyone who's spent any time with particularly toddler age kids knows - the co-ordination and motor control skills to stop quickly come on much later than the skills to get going up to a fairly quick speed! You've got people (quite reasonably) exiting the supermarket with fully ladent trollies that are not the most manouverable things in the world, and they're having to weave around these kids - and that's not right or fair on the people just trying to get their shopping done as quickly as possible and get out. Now of course someone's going to come back and say that people should be careful and shouldn't push their trollies there or something - but this is the store exit and front of a busy supermarket - it's not an appropriate place for the children to be running around playing tig or climbing on the trolley stacks (again I can see that one ending badly if one rolls lose from the stack while a child's climbing on it) and it's definitely not a safe place to be running around.

Yep... definitely an unreasonable child hater that I want those kids to be safe (and that I don't really want adults to be facing the swearing and abuse and blame that happens when one of these kids runs smack bang face first into a trolley). The best thing to do would be to have the P+C spaces further away from the supermarket door, with a fenced walkway through between the rows of cars (could even be covered since children are apparently allergic to rain these days) so there's no risk at all of kids darting off between cars or the like - move the whole accident waiting to happen away from the crowded store front etc because at least in our local Tesco the whole thing is a nightmare. It's not a playground - it's not an appropriate place for kids to be running around having fun... the entire world is not obligated to become a massive Ikea ball pool - there are places that are part of the adult world and children need to behave accordingly when in these areas.

Hmmm maybe you should do your shopping online then you will have to endure any children playing.

minnie123

dizziblonde wrote: »

I have anger at those who have children, want to abdicate all responsibility for them and believe the world owes them everything purely on the basis that they have children. I object to the fact that those without children are (frequently insenitively as you never know the reasons behind someone's childless status) stereotyped as callous, uncaring, insensitive, hedonistic psychopaths and how they are marginalized and discriminated against within society - and the ensuing knee jerk reaction whenever they dare speak out against the entire world being converted into some pastel-toned ballpool.

I object quite strongly to children running riot in spaces where it's not appropriate to be running riot in - I'm talking about shops, restaurants, carparks (I've winced seeing some kids come running full pelt out of our local leisure centre miles ahead of their parents as they're basically running perilously close to the traffic). I don't think it's unreasonable to not be happy if you go out to a restaurant and there are children running around - but if you dare express that view - you get jumped on as some rabid anti-child person who can't possibly understand and I don't think that's a fair way to treat people - but it's how the world is becoming, where those who don't have children are not entitled to a view or rights.

I'm sick of being told that I'm a second class citizen because I don't have children - it's especially unpleasant when the reason I don't have children is because of plumbing issues... so not only are you treated like dirt by society, but you have your nose repeatedly rubbed in it.

But ultimately at the end of the day - YOU have the child, YOU bring it up, not the state, not every single other person in the world and I'm sick of the sector of parents who constantly want to pass the buck and blame anyone and everyone for anything that happens other than taking on responsibility themselves for the human being that they brought into the world.

And yes by the way - our local Tesco has the carpark layout from hell - I remain convinced the designer was drunk in charge of a ruler when he planned it as it's stupid, it's flipping dangerous and it's rubbishly designed - and by the time they've yanked half the spaces out for Mr AutoWindscreen to tout for business, the car valet bloke in the corner's taken up his chunk of the carpark - there are no flipping spaces left!

I don't understand all this feeling like a second class citizen for not having children stuff. I am a recent mother so up until a year ago I was childless and I didn't feel like a second class citizen or that parents got more rights than me. Now I am a mother I feel no different. Oh but I get to park in a wider space if there is one free which I appreciate but don't demand. Your comments are ridiculously over the top.

dacouch

The best way to avoid all of these problems is to shop at Tescos 24 hour store and go after about 10ish. You have the choice of spaces in the car park, the choice of stock can sometimes be limited as they restock then, the isles are nice and empty, however you can listen to the shelf stackers sing songs out of tune. The only problem can be if you do not like the self service tills.

gardner1

I use tesco parent/child spaces all the time [yes i have no kids with me] because i am sick of getting car damaged by morons who park to close.I could park at far end of car park not a car in sight but sods law when you come back top of car park is still empty but some !!!!!!!! has parked an inch away from me
Message to tesco/asda/etc make parking spaces bigger for all

olias

Just fancied putting my tuppence worth in! -

I agree with a lot (not all!) of what dizziblonde has said. I live in a quiet and small market town and I have many of the same issues. In my local supermarket (Morrisons, seen as you asked), I regularly have to suffer the mam, dad and 5 kids all using the shopping trip as a day out. You get 7 people moving around in a group through narrow aisles (it's a small supermarket) stopping for 5 minutes to discuss the various merits of chicken nuggets vs pizza, oblivious to the folk stood behind then coughing politedly to indicate that perhaps they would like the opportunity to actually see whats on the shelf!

Worse still is when the kids (inevitably) get bored and wander off to run screaming up and down the aisles, climing up the shelves, climbing into the freezer cabinets, making a 'tent' out of the cereal boxes and climbing into it (all of this and worse, I have seen!)

Als, don't get me started on the 'family' trolleys with a go kart type thing attached to the front for the kiddies to sit in that seem to have appeared in the last few years and make the whole thing about 15 foot long - who's bright idea was that!

Then there is the way that they always decide to stop actually IN the doorway to have a nice chat/clean the dribble off juniors chin/open the little darlings packet of sweets etc, oblivious to the queue of people behind waiting to get out/in

I could go on, but you get the picture

Once you have suffered the above (and worse!), the parking spaces are the least of your worries

Olias

gardner1

olias wrote: »

Just fancied putting my tuppence worth in! -

I agree with a lot (not all!) of what dizziblonde has said. I live in a quiet and small market town and I have many of the same issues. In my local supermarket (Morrisons, seen as you asked), I regularly have to suffer the mam, dad and 5 kids all using the shopping trip as a day out. You get 7 people moving around in a group through narrow aisles (it's a small supermarket) stopping for 5 minutes to discuss the various merits of chicken nuggets vs pizza, oblivious to the folk stood behind then coughing politedly to indicate that perhaps they would like the opportunity to actually see whats on the shelf!

Worse still is when the kids (inevitably) get bored and wander off to run screaming up and down the aisles, climing up the shelves, climbing into the freezer cabinets, making a 'tent' out of the cereal boxes and climbing into it (all of this and worse, I have seen!)

Als, don't get me started on the 'family' trolleys with a go kart type thing attached to the front for the kiddies to sit in that seem to have appeared in the last few years and make the whole thing about 15 foot long - who's bright idea was that!

Then there is the way that they always decide to stop actually IN the doorway to have a nice chat/clean the dribble off juniors chin/open the little darlings packet of sweets etc, oblivious to the queue of people behind waiting to get out/in

I could go on, but you get the picture

Once you have suffered the above (and worse!), the parking spaces are the least of your worries

Olias

then when they get to the till trolley is full of burgers/pizza/crisps/rola cola and sweets

sinderella_2

poet123 wrote: »

I am really very sorry about your issues with conception, however, I think that you have other unaddressed issues with children, and with those who have them. Or your problem is causing you to become bitter, and that in turn is leading you to have this venom, this obvious rage towards "families"?

If you are constantly running into people who make you feel worthless because you can't have children, I find that very strange, because most people are sympathetic and concerned aabout such issues not judgemental and cruel. Harsh though it sounds it may be your attitude, which, (whatever you may wish to believe) is evident here,which is causing these reactions in people. Your perceptions of their views, rather than the reality of the situation.

You were if I remember, on a thread recently where the tack you took about the opinions of those without children was similar, that thread did not decry or invalidate the opinions of those without children, it merely said they could not speak from experience, only from observation. That is fact, not being nasty.

A friend of my mothers moved constantly, she always had bad neighbours apparently......we met another friend in town one day and were discussing that she had moved again, as yet again the neighbours were a problem. The friend turned to my mother and said, " Isnt it strange how everywhere she goes, she has a problem, it cant always be everyone elses fault can it?" That stuck with me, and when I come across a pattern and others seem to be acting unpleasantly towards me I tend to look inward and see if I may be the one causing the problem......many times I find something I have done that has acted as a catalyst for the action/words I am on the receiving end of.

Well said, poet
Apologies for returning when I flounced away earlier..:o
Dizziblonde, I believe it is unreasonable for you to accuse various people on this thread of making assumptions about you that you are a second class citizen. I find it thoroughly objectionable to be accused of such judgement. I do not know what it is like to be unwillingly childless just as you don't know what it is like to have a child. That said, if there were car park spaces purely for people with pots of 'warm jizz' or whatever your turn of phrase earlier was, then I wouldn't use them either! (assuming I didn't have such a receptacle on me at the time)
Your underlying pain manifesting as anger and bitterness is the agenda running your argument. You are probably not the only one fired by a covert agenda, we're all human after all, but it illustrates very well how these debates never seem to get anywhere.
I can assure you I do not judge you, nor any of my friends and colleagues who are childless and I know many for whom that is not choice.
My comment earlier about people without children not being qualified to comment on the value of these spots to people with young infants was a response to the comment on here of how someone had
'never seen a baby bigger than a shopping bag'. I can safely inform you that they have missed the point somewhat and that they have never grappled with a toddler who is hell bent on running back to the shop to the thomas Tank Engine ride-on. That said, I have never encountered the mayhem that you describe at the store doors...

FatAndy

olias wrote: »

Just fancied putting my tuppence worth in! -

I agree with a lot (not all!) of what dizziblonde has said. I live in a quiet and small market town and I have many of the same issues. In my local supermarket (Morrisons, seen as you asked), I regularly have to suffer the mam, dad and 5 kids all using the shopping trip as a day out. You get 7 people moving around in a group through narrow aisles (it's a small supermarket) stopping for 5 minutes to discuss the various merits of chicken nuggets vs pizza, oblivious to the folk stood behind then coughing politedly to indicate that perhaps they would like the opportunity to actually see whats on the shelf!

Worse still is when the kids (inevitably) get bored and wander off to run screaming up and down the aisles, climing up the shelves, climbing into the freezer cabinets, making a 'tent' out of the cereal boxes and climbing into it (all of this and worse, I have seen!)

Als, don't get me started on the 'family' trolleys with a go kart type thing attached to the front for the kiddies to sit in that seem to have appeared in the last few years and make the whole thing about 15 foot long - who's bright idea was that!

Then there is the way that they always decide to stop actually IN the doorway to have a nice chat/clean the dribble off juniors chin/open the little darlings packet of sweets etc, oblivious to the queue of people behind waiting to get out/in

I could go on, but you get the picture

Once you have suffered the above (and worse!), the parking spaces are the least of your worries

Olias

It's the other way round in my local Asda. Every aisle blocked my mobs of OAPs catching up on the latest gossip or wandering aimlessly or abandoning trolleys. Perhaps it's got something to do with living in a popular retirement area which means we have more OAPs per head than most places. I rarely see large family groups and certainly never see young kids running wild in the shop or car park.

Jaffa.

mrcol1000 wrote: »

I think abled bodied people who take up disabled spaces should be excuted on the spot.

Mmmm Okay...

As a moral, abled bodied person myself, I wouldn't park in a space not meant for me and I'm sure that goes for most of people.

Disabled people have a right to a Disabled space, but with that comes responsibility and if you know that another disabled person will need that space more than you do then it's up to you to let that person have it. This is something my Aunt does even though she's a blue badge holder.

mrcol1000

Jaffa. wrote: »

Mmmm Okay...

As a moral, abled bodied person myself, I wouldn't park in a space not meant for me and I'm sure that goes for most of people.

Disabled people have a right to a Disabled space, but with that comes responsibility and if you know that another disabled person will need that space more than you do then it's up to you to let that person have it. This is something my Aunt does even though she's a blue badge holder.

That does raise the question should blind people be allowed blue badges? Or at least allowed to park in disabled spaces in car parks. I mean if your blind but can walk with no problems then surely the space is better for a person who can not walk or have problems walking rather than parking there purely because your disabled.
There is this one bit in Curb Your Enthuasim where Larry David argues with a guy who parks in a disabled spot and uses a disabled toilet whose disability is a sereve stutter.