Posted on 11/29/2006 5:30:40 AM PST by shrinkermd
With airlines squeezing more seats onto planes and flights more crowded than ever, some nasty battles are brewing, pitting passengers who recline their seats against the squished travelers sitting behind them...
Most U.S. airlines still allow seats to tip as far back as four or five inches....But now Southwest Airlines is doing something to reduce the threat of bruised knees and spilled drinks. The carrier is reducing the maximum recline in many of its seats so that customers can use laptop computers, for example, when the person in front of them wants to lean back.
...The airline decided to standardize recline at three inches, adjusting seats as planes go in for major maintenance work. s.
While Southwest offers 32 inches of space for each seat row on its Boeing 737s, many competitors have seats with less room -- 31-inch rows for the most part, with some as tight as 30 inches. Yet most other airlines also allow at least four inches of recline in seats...
(Excerpt) Read more at online.wsj.com ...
I know:') I was just kidding too.
Thanks for the information. I'm a cotton and wool person anyway, simply because both are more comfortable to me. But now I have safety reasons too.
Flying used to be classy. Flying used to be expensive.
Now everybody can afford it. If someone wants the class of bygone days, they can pay the bygone prices and ride first class.
***
Actually, the price depends on the market where you live. For a long time, Useless Airways held the monopoly on air travel in my neck of the woods and charged twice as much as everyone else as a result. There are some low cost carriers now, but Useless Airways continues to charge outrageous prices for lousy service. At least with the cut-rate carriers, I don't tend to mind the lousy conditions as much -- I guess it's because the cost is so cheap -- the term "getting what you pay for" applies and I know that. But with a major carrier such as Useless Airways I would like to get a little more "bang for the buck" so to speak. Even an occasional kind word from the crew and ground personnel would be nice. Heck, I get kindness from Southwest personnel all the time, and I'm not paying outrageous prices for it.
Every time I fly, the amount of reclining room the seat in front of me has is limited to a fraction above zero. I'm 6'-5"....unless the airlines can find a way for me to stow my legs in the bins above me, the person in front of me better be prepared to stay upright for the duration of the flight
They come on the plane carrying crates of what appears to be pigs and chickens that they attempt to cram in the overhead, smashing your belongings to a pulp.
I used to prefer a window seat but no longer can I tolerate being crammed in by these slobs so I sit on the aisle, however that is not without it's hazzards - crates of pigs and chickens hitting you in the head, some child who is left defensless by his or her parents, whacks you with his backpack.
I have even had a "flight attendant" sit a toddler next to me and ask me to "help him with his meal (back in the days when there was one) because his mommy is 6 rows ahead with a baby." I responded, "No thanks but I'll gladly give the you my seat so you can feed the child yourself."
You OBVIOUSLY haven't flown the Pago Pago route on Hawaiian. It's a hoot when you land in Honolulu, and the baggage carousel has a broken cardboard box and ice and fish are strewn about..
Not even going to talk about weight...
But then, they do FEED you on Hawaiian. Though, because I wore shorts (heading to the tropics means dressing down) I missed out on lunching before the flight at a private club..
A young mother sat in the seat next to one of the bathrooms and kept bending to get something out of her diaper bag on the floor under the seat in front of her that was most distressing to everyone within eyesight.
Don't get me wrong, I'm certainly not a prude but a certain amount of caution needs to be noted before donning a super low pair of pants, especially when one still is carrying one's "baby fat".
From the front, the view wasn't much better, as the pants didn't fit completely zipped up with the snap fastened so she simply attached a large safety pin very low on her abdomen, while clutching her baby in one hand and her pants in the other.
Naturally, the pants were about 4 - 5 inches too long so she kept walking all over them. What a sight!
Noise canceling headphones work well. Philips HN110 are compact and fold up for travel. 65 bucks at BestBuy.
That's the answer--charge ticket prices based on the area and weight the passenger takes up or wants.
The Free Market, at your service!
I was on a SW flight recently and placed my laptop under the seat in front of me. That person decided to recline, and I could not bend over far enough to reach my laptop. It was kind of funny. I'm rather tall though so my situation may not be the norm.
That kind of thing has happened to me. I had to ask them to move the seat up for a second.
The inability to use a laptop when someone reclines is the most aggrivating.
Since most airline entertainment is generally pointless or PC pablum I never want to see anyways, it is bets to rely on the laptop.
An hour or two (or 8) of typing time is useful no matter how you slice it.
Someone posted a link to a recliner brake that attaches to your tray brace. It seems like a good idea until the old hag stewardes who still thinks she looks as pretty as she did in the 1960's demands you take it off for safety reasons.
It is too bad planes can be reconfigured "on the fly". Thus if a flight is mostly empty, the empty seats would fold up and the rest would spread out.
"Dad" would have said he was more comfortable in his tie.
I had the window seat on the last row on a Southwest flight. My seat was against the back bulkhead and it would NOT recline. The seat in front of me was defective and reclined way too far backward. As soon as were were off the ground the b*tch in front of me tipped back and the back of her seat was 6 or 8 inches from my face. I asked her several times to move it back up but she ignored me. Did I mention that I am claustrophobic? I came boiling out of the seat and crawled across my husband and the young service man in the aisle seat. the stewardess came running up to tell me I HAD to sit down. Long story short, my husband is not claustrophobic so he too my seat and kicked the b*tch all the way to Denver about every 30 seconds. The reason I know she was a b*tch was because she never put her seat up and the stew never asked her to put it up. The good news is I know the b*tch didn't sleep a wink.
My boss wears flip-flops when flying both for comfort and to ease travel through security lines. I stick with velcro or other easily-removed shoes. My boss is Gold Medallion on Delta, and I'm a high-mileage Silver, so you learn how to expedite your travel.
Oh, and First Class is nice and roomy. Delta has unlimited free upgrades for Medallion members. Unfortunately, the pecking order goes by mileage, and many domestic flights (especially from San Antonio) are on CRJs.
In NYC a bunch of subway trains were purchased by Japanese manufacturers, and designed with the Japanese tushie in mind. The seats were very narrow, and people were practically falling off. As a fellow passenger said, the seats were meant for a "sushi tushie."
The seats were later taken out & replaced with standard bench-like features.
Thanks for the tip.
I was headed to SeaTac via Chicago when SeaTac was fogged in (for three days; I caught the final day of it) and had to take a small chartered jet provided by the airlines that came up from Florida -- they were scrambling to get ahold of anything to move people by that third day -- and there was one of said Screaming Babies aboard. I had a migraine and was still sick with the stomach flu. It takes a few hours to fly that route so I finally passed an anonymous note to the parents, "Would you consider putting a little Vodka in your baby's orange juice?"
The father leapt up and looked around with a very evil look in his eye. I slid down in the seat lol. But the parents got out a bottle, gave it to the kid, and silence ensued. I think the baby's ears were plugged from ascending, and drinking the bottle unplugged them.
Another airline disaster averted, by GretchenM.
It's G-IV for me, all the way.
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