4 not-too-unrealistic airline passenger wishes for 2012. What are yours?

Janice, these are all good ideas. I don’t see the “child- or baby-free zone” happening anytime soon but in theory it’s an excellent idea. Southwest, many years ago (the 90′s? or maybe earlier?) experimented with this, informing “families with children” who were pre-boarding that they had to sit beyond row 13.  (That was due to the rampant abuse of pre-boarding by “families with children”.)  It didn’t last long and I’m told that “families with children” were complaining non-stop about it.  (Southwest’s current boarding system, where “family boarding” occurs after A 1-60, is much more efficient, which speaks to your item #4.)  Premium economy seating at a reasonable price?  I’m with ya, but airlines are going to charge what the market will bear so I can’t fault them that.  I do agree that United’s Premium Economy is some of the best money I’ve ever spent. Enforcement of carry-on rules!  Oh h*ll yes!  But who is to enforce it?  Everyone thinks someone else should do it. I’ve heard flight attendants who complain that gate agents don’t enforce it, and the gate agents complain that carry-on rules are not enforced at security by TSA. And so on. The problem is the all-too-vague “personal item” clause in the carry-on rules. And there will always be the problem of “entitled passengers” who feel the rules don’t apply to them as they board with a roller bag, briefcase, laptop, and “purse” (women) or “satchel” (men).  The worst are the men and women who strap all their stuff to their roller bag and then call it “ONE carry-on” with a straight face.   I could extrapolate on carry-ons all day, as, I’m sure, could you.  Most recently (last night in PHX) a woman boarded my flight with a roller bag, HUGE purse (a duffel bag, really), briefcase, laptop and diaper bag. The problem? She wasn’t traveling with a baby or small child.  The gate agent busted her on this but let her board anyway as the flight was going out very, very light (40 passengers tops).  However, that just means another gate agent or flight attendant is going to have to deal with her the next time she flies; when told he’s carrying too many carry-on items she’ll whine, “But they let me bring all this on my last flight!”  You get the picture. Great column, Janice. 

Janice, these are all good ideas. I don’t see the “child- or baby-free zone” happening anytime soon but in theory it’s an excellent idea. Southwest, many years ago (the 90′s? or maybe earlier?) experimented with this, informing “families with children” who were pre-boarding that they had to sit beyond row 13.  (That was due to the rampant abuse of pre-boarding by “families with children”.)  It didn’t last long and I’m told that “families with children” were complaining non-stop about it.  (Southwest’s current boarding system, where “family boarding” occurs after A 1-60, is much more efficient, which speaks to your item #4.)  Premium economy seating at a reasonable price?  I’m with ya, but airlines are going to charge what the market will bear so I can’t fault them that.  I do agree that United’s Premium Economy is some of the best money I’ve ever spent. Enforcement of carry-on rules!  Oh h*ll yes!  But who is to enforce it?  Everyone thinks someone else should do it. I’ve heard flight attendants who complain that gate agents don’t enforce it, and the gate agents complain that carry-on rules are not enforced at security by TSA. And so on. The problem is the all-too-vague “personal item” clause in the carry-on rules. And there will always be the problem of “entitled passengers” who feel the rules don’t apply to them as they board with a roller bag, briefcase, laptop, and “purse” (women) or “satchel” (men).  The worst are the men and women who strap all their stuff to their roller bag and then call it “ONE carry-on” with a straight face.   I could extrapolate on carry-ons all day, as, I’m sure, could you.  Most recently (last night in PHX) a woman boarded my flight with a roller bag, HUGE purse (a duffel bag, really), briefcase, laptop and diaper bag. The problem? She wasn’t traveling with a baby or small child.  The gate agent busted her on this but let her board anyway as the flight was going out very, very light (40 passengers tops).  However, that just means another gate agent or flight attendant is going to have to deal with her the next time she flies; when told he’s carrying too many carry-on items she’ll whine, “But they let me bring all this on my last flight!”  You get the picture. Great column, Janice. 

I have to agree on the Economy Plus issue. I was /am a 2 million miler on AA and when the whole plane was “economy plus type seating ” it was great. When they changed I moved more to UA. As a premier level flyer I almost always get free economy plus. It is worth it despite all of UA’s other issues. I am not sure what is better for loyalty, “economy plus seating” or FF programs. 

Airlines need to charge a fare that covers expenses, then offer reasonable leg room,
Free checked bags, connectivity, and a few perks to make the fare paid a good value. The reality is airline bosses won,t do it for fear of losing market share, and
Customers still search for the lowest fare. So what happens? You get what you pay
For, but not what you would like.

I think the airlines made a mistake charging for checked luggage.  Instead, they should be charging for luggage that is being carried on board.  There’s nothing more aggravating than a passenger in the front section of the plane trying to navigate to the middle of the plane to get his bag out of an overhead bin he had to use because so many others have used the bins near his seat with excessive bags.

I wonder what would happen if a traveler, finding the above seat bin full of other passengers gear, would simply pull out the offending luggage, replace it with his/hers, and shout out, “Come get your bags and put them over your own seat.” 
What kind of fuss would FAs make? Would it get the ‘offender’ taken off the plane before the doors closed? Would it make a difference to the carrier?Ah, my fantasy………

1) I would love this, but I think it would end badly.  Because the more entitled parents – as discussed here before, it’s not all parents, but a very visible and vocal class – would be upset about something.  Or they would end up walking the aisles non-stop anyway.

I really think airlines should just offer “family-friendly” flights – gauged for family-friendly times (i.e. – late-morning or early-afternoon, when business travelers are generally not flying) and offer SW type seating groups so people can seat their families together.  So not barred to single travelers or childless travelers, but if it’s marked as “family friendly”, then people know what they are getting themselves into.

2) I would like to see an airline simply go back to more legroom across the board.  And advertise that they care more about treating everyone like real people than squeeze everyone into cattle cars.  If you knew you could get an economy seat where your knees weren’t in your teeth, wouldn’t you fly that airline more often?

3) Because this is so simple and logical, I feel like this is the biggest pipe dream of all.

4) I don’t know if this will ever stop.  The only thing I can think is that other airlines should start assigning boarding numbers to people as they check in. Or that after they seat elites (because that perq is probably one of the more valuable) and anyone who paid for premium boarding (like UA offers), they actually go back to boarding people from the back of the plane forward.  As it stands, zones seem to have no relevance to rows.

I don’t know whatever happened to that but half the problem with boarding is someone stopping in the middle of the plane to get themselves settled.  If you board from the back (and have FA’s watching to make sure people use OHB’s appropriately), then the process should go faster.

I would like to see overhead space assigned to the specific seat number.

Marked and sectioned off to put your bag in and if you have extra space you can sell it off to someone who needs it!

That way it will pay for those of us whose carry-on and personal bag follow the rules of the airlines.

Regarding having limited competition for United’s Economy Plus product…Delta announced a couple of months ago that they are expanding their similar premium economy section (they call it Economy Comfort Class) to their entire fleet and route system (thus including all domestic routes as opposed to just international) and including regional jets.  Their press release states that passengers will be able to reserve those seats beginning this spring for travel commencing summer of 2012 and beyond. 

They are already offering the Economy Comfort section on domestic transcon and other select long haul segments.

So I guess the pressure is on the other larger carriers (e.g. American, Usairways) to compete in this arena.

They are not nearly so concerned with what is aggravating as with what is profitable. Checked luggage fees are keeping several airlines profitable right now.

you get the last passenger onboard and they expect storage overhead.  (like they’re on a private jet) They open ONE overhead, see that it’s full and look at the flight attendant with disgust. REALLY?????

Perfect case in point, if tongue-in-cheek.  Personality-less flight attendant is protrayed as reasonable, if cheerless.  Frequest flyer is a complete buffoon.  FAs can relate to this,stereotypecasting the customer as a rude idiot. 

And the legacy airlines wonder why many international airlines are preferred by frequent flyers over every USA-based carrier.  When you have a fairly generic product, the difference is in personal service in delivering the product.  If some resent this, well, then maybe they don’t like their jobs and they should hang it up.