Why U.S. Flyers Are World's Most Uncomfortable

Above, the Boeing 787 Dreamliner I flew to Japan in. Photo by Armand Vaquer.

Smartertravel.com's Today In Travel has an interesting article on why Americans tend to whine more often and loudly than travelers of other countries when the subject is comfort aboard airliners.

They start it with:

You may have noticed: Americans seem to kvetch more loudly and more often than travelers from other countries. Are we just a bunch of spoiled whiners? 

We may indeed be spoiled whiners, but we do have at least one compelling reason to be unhappy with the travel experience: We're flying on fuller planes.

During my recent trip to Japan, I flew with United Airlines. The planes (Boeing 787 Dreamliners) were full during my flights to and from Japan. Actually, I don't recall ever being on a plane in previous trips to Japan that weren't full.

They also note:

But for flyers, high load factors translate directly into discomfort. That's especially true in coach, where legroom has decreased by 10 percent over the past two decades.

This is interesting, considering that I previously posted that I had no complaints about the legroom in the Economy section aboard the Dreamliner. I had plenty of room and was able to stretch out my legs. The only complaint I had on this trip was the food.

I may have had plenty of room for my legs, but there was one thing I did notice and it was a little annoying. On both flights, I sat in the aisle seat and kept getting bumped by people walking down the aisle to go to the restroom or being bumped by flight attendants' food and drink carts. Could it be that the aisles are more narrow?

To read the full article, go here.