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catalogues through flyers’ own tablets and
phones. A more densely packed plane can off-
set the price of these add-ons in a few months.
Diversion is one of the framers’ last cards
to play. They’ve pushed the geometry of seat-
ing almost as far as our girth will allow it to go.
There’s just one thing left to give: the recline.
Those few centimetres, Roca-Toha explains,
might slightly improve one person’s sit-
uation but will likely downgrade that
of whoever’s behind them. If one flyer
reclines, the rest of the plane also has to,
if only to reclaim the space ceded to the
instigator. “A good compromise is a pre-
recline—a natural recline that is fixed in place.
It’s kinder, and more natural,” Roca-Toha says.
Frontier Airlines and Spirit now have station-
ary, pre-reclined seats, and overseas carriers
British Airways, Norwegian, and Ryanair have
also opted to do away with tilting chairs.
My fellow passengers and I navigated these
tiny spaces while we hurtled above the south-
western Sonoran desert. In this moment, in
transit to work or our loved ones, the cabin
design forced us in each other’s way. Getting
into and out of my row, I’d apologised to my
seatmates. A few rows up, another man did the
same; “I have terrible news,” he said, announc-
ing himself to his neighbours.
We blame each other, and ourselves, for our
discomfort. But we are wrong. “It’s not you,”
Robinette says. “Most people are near average
size. That’s literally why it’s an average. But
people assume it’s them, not the product.” It’s
the product. It can be fixed.
Right now, nearly everyone is, to varying
degrees, uncomfortable on an aeroplane. And
yet sometimes, we band together and cry out:
Enough! The designers do listen. Roca-Toha
explains that passenger feedback—from survey
cards and online forms—is the most powerfultool framers have in perfecting craft.
I was sceptical, but she’s right. Remember
American’s plan to add more seats across
its fleet? The scheme would have chopped
pitch to 730 mm on the carrier’s new 737s, but
attendants and passengers protested, taking to
Twitter and Facebook to complain. The com-
pany instead cut its extra-legroom option on
one row, and spread the space across the econ-
omy cabin, holding pitch at 760 mm. Don’t
laugh: 30 mm of wiggle room is a small victory
for us, but consider the airline’s sacrifice: the
padded profits from thousands of upgraded
trips. If we can do that, maybe we can do one
better. Wider seats? Roomier rows? Or we can
start small: No saddle seats, ever.illustrations by Sinelab
SKY CAMP:
Bunks
Making room to lie down on long-haul flights typically means airlines can’t fit as
many travellers on board. Jacob Innovations’ proposed FlexSeat setup stacks the
beds. The company claims the tiered cots better accommodate large travellers
and provide room for bigger carry-ons. Just be careful standing up.Framers have pushed
the geometry of seating
almost as far as our
girth will allow it to go.