Travel light or wear big heavy hiking boots (or both....)
No pretense here of solving the various problems which beset the stowage and carriage of baggage of airline passengers. Rather, a look back to the past, and a question about something that might work, maybe.
Many years back, a mere lad of schoolboy age, I relished the carrying of a hanging garment bag when I traveled - always in coach, never in First Class - and politely asking (well, mostly politely) a "stewardess" -- that is what they were called then -- if I could hang the garment bag in the little closet-like space typically either at the front door of the cabin or at the back of the First Class section. (As a debate team member I often traveled with sport jackets and so on, hence the bag.)
I'd be willing to wager that service-members in most any sub-branch of the Armed Forces of any NATO or similarly allied country, traveling today on a C-17 or similar transport, don't worry too much about where their duffels and other equipage gets stowed. They don't need much in the way of advance reservations and they also (with rare and incidental exceptions, I suppose) have and use sufficient self-reliance. Maybe the airlines should start treating passengers like troops. You know, when was something that defies common sense ever excusable in uniform?
(Hat, gloves, under the desk)
Last edited by WillowRun 6-3; 19th Dec 2015 at 03:08.
Reason: little problem with leaving out a "don't"