Parental advice for central travellers (Central Trains)

Member Name: English Lady

Product:	Central Trains
Date:	06/08/02 (89 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Clean, fairly spacious, Good customer service

Disadvantages: Baby change platform dangerous., exit button too low to reach for someone standing up., No space to put changing items

This is a very simple piece of advice.
Avoid ,at all costs, the baby changing facilities on central trains. In particular the Liverpool-Norwich service.
I learnt this ,at my own cost, the other week when I was on my way home to Liverpool from Stockport with my 9 month old daughter Bethanny and it became obvious she was in need of a nappy change.
At first I was impressed by the very fact the train HAD baby changeing facilities, as I was pretty certain the other passengers would not be impressed if I had carried out the neccesary task on the table in front of them!
So off I trot, innocently I enter the toilet cubicle and pull down the baby changing mat. No correction it turned out to be more of a changing slab. Flat as a fluke, hard as marble and with absolutly no restrains.
Any parent knows the absolute nightmare of holding a wiggling toddler still with one hand whilst dealing with soiled nappies, wipes, cream and a new nappy with the other. Add to this the fact I was on a moving train rocking quite alarmingly from side to side and I am sure you understand by now my stress levels were definitely on the up.
This is all bad enough but add to it the fact there is nowhere to put your bag of bits (essential to any parent, usually filled with nappies wipes,clothes,food, toys and many other odds and ends) and it really becomes a bind. So I put it in the only place I can see, next to the sink beside me. As I go to reach in and grab an item I catch it with my elbow and it falls into the sink. Not much of a problem you'd think. Well it is when the water sprays out automatically when something is put in the sink. My bag was full of water before I could pull it out again. Luckily I had already fished out the clean nappy or I would have been up the proverbial creek.
Ok so I have done it,I have got a clean nappy on my howling child,whilst managing to hold her on a shaking, flat block of shiny, seemingly well polished slab of plastic now
all i have to do is get out. Where is the exit button? Right down by my knees. Ok I accept this is obviously a modification for wheelchair users and a good thing; but for a stressed out parent holding a wiggling screaming child plus sodden bag of "stuff" it is lesss than ideal. Maybe, I suggest adding another button higher up.
Credit where credit is due I emailed Central trains and the next day I received a reply apologising for any inconvienience, which did make me feel a bit better.
I write this artical not so much as a complaint about Central trians but more as a forewarning to all you train using parents out there. As they say in the scouts "be prepared"

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