No, really: Standing-room airline tickets!

I sometimes refer to airline coach seating as "cattle class", but Airbus is taking the concept to a new low. This excerpt is from an April 25 article by Christopher Elliott of the New York Times:

Airbus has been quietly pitching the standing-room-only option to Asian carriers, though none have agreed to it yet. Passengers in the standing section would be propped against a padded backboard, held in place with a harness, according to experts who have seen a proposal.

While this seating plan may not "fly" in this country, the airlines are finding new ways to cram more seats into coach class, as evidenced by American Airline's "density modification program," says the New York Times article. Not surprisingly, the motivation is money:

... American said its "density modification program" had added five more seats to the economy-class section of its MD-80 narrow-body aircraft and brought the total seat count to 120 in the back of the plane. A document on an internal American Airlines Web site, which was briefly accessible to the public last week, estimated that the program would generate an additional $60 million a year for its MD-80 fleet.

Maybe American's new motto should be "sticking it to the little guy."

Caveat emptor!


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