Originally Posted by
Flapping_Madly
May I chip in with an opinion? I am only a lowly SLF and a regular user of Ryanair. Recently I had the pleasure of flying on one of their very latest 737-800s. It really was only days old and had the new skinny seats -still with absolutely nowhere to put anything at all-- not even a place to stash the wrist watch perfume and snacks price list which ends on the floor. At least the knee room was better but the back was hard.
But the nub of this post was the overhead lockers. When we got on all the bins were open. So we began to look for our row. We could not see any row numbers. Very odd everyone thought. Then a small woman shouted out "Oh look they are here".
The row and seat numbers are on the front of the bins. Instead of having a front door that opens upwards and leaving the numbers on display the new scoop shaped bins drop down towards the floor and take the numbers down with them. The row and seat numbers are only visible if you are sub five feet in height and looking directly upwards. Like most male and some female passengers my eye level was above the downward pointing numbers. Sure slowed things up.
I chatted to an English speaking cabin crew about the weird number placement and she agreed. She also said the bins take far more effort to push up to close. She was not full of joy.
I thought it was triumph of design over function. Often called progress.
Overall the lighting and general appearance was very pleasant and a real improvement.
Just my two cents worth.
Thanks for a brilliant website.
That's not unlike the problem I saw the first few times I flew on an Airbus. It's been long enough that I don't really recall what type or what airline, but on boarding there were no row numbers visible as I was walking down the aisle. For whatever reason, the row and seat numbers were labeled on this little octagonal or hexagonal projection whcih projected down from the bottom of the overhead, near the reading lights and F/A call buttons. I'm of average height and had to duck down to read the numbers, they weren't visible from a normal upright stance in the aisle. I remember thinking that it was kind of a stupid design. I guess other people thought so as I haven't seen that particular "feature" in a decade or 2. Interesting to see that Boeing has managed to essentially duplicate the problem, in their own special way.