After my last blog, which was of course tongue-in-cheek, I began doing some research in earnest into the topic of creating "family sections" aboard long-haul flights in which families with children, say those under the age of 16, would automatically be booked by airlines. Seems I was in no way alone with my "crazy notion" - sources supporting the idea are numerous. Here are but a very few:
"No Babies on Board
Seventy-one percent of travelers surveyed think families with young children should sit in their own section of a plane. Thirteen percent think airlines should prohibit parents from flying with infants, except in the event of an emergency. Thirty-seven percent would pay extra to sit in a quiet section of an airplane, and of that group, 38 percent would pay as much as a 6-10 percent premium."
Survey shows ups and downs of air travel
30 September 2008
KUALA LUMPUR — Leading global market intelligence firm Synovate, today released global survey results on airline travel showing 56% of people choose 'getting there quickly and easily' as the best thing about air travel and, once on board, three quarters would like to be able to change seats if they were unhappy with their allocation.
Synovate spoke with more than 10,000 respondents in 13 markets across the world to find all about whether air travel was pleasure or pain, the impact of fuel costs and surcharges, easy-on-the-eye flight attendants, the frustrations of sitting near other people's children and chatty fellow passengers ...Children shouldn't be seen, or heard
It turns out not everyone hates sitting near children. In good news for paranoid parents, two thirds of our air traveller respondents disagreed with the statement 'I get frustrated when sitting next to or near children'.
However, Britons were found to be most intolerant of children on planes with 55% agreeing they find sitting near the smallest travellers to be frustrating. They were closely followed by Hong Kongers (52% agreed). Least likely to get frustrated were German travellers with only 15% agreeing. [N.B. This may explain why Lufthansa is not at the forefront of my proposed "Family Section Movement"]
Looking at the results by gender, it is not too surprising to see that overall women are far more tolerant of air-borne kids. However, in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), 48% of women agreed they find sitting near children frustrating and only 24% of men did.
George Christodoulides, Managing Director of Synovate in the UAE, said this may, in part, be due to large families and gender roles.
"When it comes to supervising children men tend to be fairly hands-off, while women travellers may be so busy empathising with harassed mothers that they are not really able to relax themselves."
Wanted: Child-free flights and no wind chimes
Neither are likely, but we can reduce discomfort when traveling with kids
Everyone has their idea of a perfect world. For me, it would include a ban on wind chimes. My friend Camille would be happy if “airlines would offer child-free flights.”
I know I’m not likely to get much of a buy-in on a world without wind chimes. And no airline seems likely to roll out a schedule of child-free flights anytime soon. [...] Of course, anyone who buys a ticket has a right to a seat on an airplane. But it’s invariably those days when you’re looking forward to a little quiet time or shut-eye on a flight that at least one otherwise angelic kid (rarely yours; most often someone else’s) will decide to spend the entire trip crying, whining, rolling on the floor or kicking the back of your seat. [...] In mid-January, for example, an AirTran flight from Florida to Massachusetts was unexpectedly delayed while the parents of a three-year old girl tried in vain to get their child seated and buckled up for takeoff. Finally, citing the Federal Aviation Administration’s (FAA) rule that everyone over age two must be buckled up in their own seat for takeoff, the airline asked the family to step off the plane so that everyone who was seated and buckled up could get on with their trip.
[...]Looking back at the flurry of media stories, articles and blog postings about the incident, some interesting themes pop up: while a few people expressed empathy for the parents, pretty much everyone cheered the airline for refusing to delay the flight for one cranky passenger. In fact, according to Judy Graham-Weaver, AirTran Airways Manager of Public Relations, the airline itself has gotten more than 9,000 e-mails about the incident and they “overwhelmingly (about 95 percent) support the airline’s actions in the story.”
The poll that accompanied this 2008 article is even more revealing (despite its spelling errors):
Travellers in favour of child-free flights
Survey indicates support for separate section on planes for babies and young children
An overwhelming majority of air passengers would prefer that people who travel with young children are seated in a different section of the plane, according to a US-based consumer group.
The survey, carried out by airfarewatchdog.com, found that 85 per cent of the 10,000 travellers surveyed thought that segregating those travelling with children from other passengers was a good idea, due to their frustration at hyperactive youngsters and crying infants. ...
“There is no reason why this couldn’t be introduced,” said James Freemantle, a spokesman for the Air Transport Users Council. “Many airlines already use systems where passengers pick their own seating, so asking those travelling with children to sit in a certain section of the plane is entirely up to the airline.”
Hmmm, momentum grows...
Isn't it time for child-free flights?
By Frank Barrett, Travel Editor, The Mail on Sunday
Forget mobile phones (for a moment): according to a survey this week, do you know what the number one in-flight irritation is for air travellers?
Top of the list – at 81 per cent (ahead of ‘lack of leg room’ at 78 per cent and ‘the person in front putting his seat back’ at 74 per cent) – is ‘people kicking your seat’. Who are these people who kick your seat? Kids, of course.
[...]If airlines are off-loading drunk passengers, isn’t it time they started dumping hopeless parents. Why should we have to suffer miserable flights just because parents find it impossible to say: ‘Don’t do that'?
If you have the Bash Street Kids sitting behind you, a mobile phone ringing would, by comparison, seem like gentle bells ringing in heaven. What about child-free flights – advertised, of course, with a ‘baby not on board’ sign?
Simon Calder: Child-free flights...
[...]First, the problem: flying is an uncomfortable enough experience for adults, let alone babes-in-arms. Combine an alien environment with the legal requirement to sit still at certain stages of the flight, and the pain caused to young ears by changes in cabin pressure, and you have the recipe for an upset infant.
Older children simply get bored non-rigid, and may decide that the best way to pass the time is by arguing, fighting or repetitively kicking the seat in front in a 21st-century adaptation of Chinese water torture.
Personally, I find many children behave much better on flights than do adults, partly because they do not see it as their duty to drink the trolley dry of alcohol. But I accept that finding on an overnight flight that you are adjacent to a toddler is in the same league as sharing an armrest with an especially obese passenger, or one whose personal hygiene standards do not match your own.
Other areas of the travel industry have a lot of experience at keeping out children. Some Caribbean resorts are adult-only; and the proprietor of a smart South Coast boutique hotel told me that he uses pricing to try to deter families from staying. Similarly some of Britain's train operators seem to want to minimise the number of children in first class by charging adult prices, for example for Weekend First upgrades.
Next, how would it work? Banning child flyers altogether would be outrageous. But a partial prohibition is worth trying. These days, the airlines need every penny they can get. Business travellers and well-heeled holidaymakers could be prepared to pay a premium for a flight free of kicking and screaming. And if people on child-free services are prepared to pay extra, then fares on other flights may come down.
The only circumstances I can envisage in which an airline could insist "no children" would be on a route with plenty of flights. British Airways, for example, has eight departures a day from Heathrow to New York JFK; and if families were banned from the 3.15pm service, they would not have to wait long for the 4pm.
The idea would be easy to test, as BA showed 20 years ago. Until 1988 all its flights had a smoking area, in which I gleefully travelled while misspending my youth. Then the airline started to test the then-preposterous concept of "smoke-free" flights. Almost apologetically, BA deemed one of the daily Los Angeles services non-smoking. Many passengers loved it, and smoking was soon stubbed out on all UK airlines.
Suppose an airline were brave enough to start some child-free flights. The downside: some families would be inconvenienced by not being able to travel on the exact flight they wanted.
But if significant numbers of families felt disadvantaged, this could persuade other airlines to come in offering family-friendly flights. The market – you, me and a couple of hundred million other people – will decide.
Hmmm... I think we have the wrong end of the stick here, people. Children-free flights are a very dumb idea which will never fly! Instead, the "Family Section" idea to which people with these little "darlings" are automatically limited to is the way to go. For the airlines allowing "on line check in," there's no problem, either. After indicating online that you are flying with your little brats, er, darlings, the seat-selection chart would automatically only allow you to choose seats in that part of the plane... no big whoop there. Leave the kiddies at home or abandon them returning home and voila! - you are again free to choose any available seats anywhere on the aircraft at check-in!So, dear reader, who's with me? Let's start a massive campaign on Twitter, FaceBook, and everywhere else demanding that airlines finally wake up and bring in these sections - and now, not, "sometime in the near future."
I'm all for family sections! I would also like to sit with people who don't smell bad.
Posted by: gina | June 10, 2010 at 18:04