I thought it would be good to end the week on a happy note. Cathay Pacific has apparently decided to replace its torturous coach seats. I’ve never flown in these seats, but I don’t recall ever seeing such backlash at a simple coach seat.

I first wrote about these seats way back in September 2006. At the time, I said “These have some great new features that could help make flying economy much more bearable.” It appears that I couldn’t have been more wrong.

These were some of the first seats to recline into themselves. In other words, instead of the seat reclining backwards, it had the front slide forward to create the recline. That reduced legroom a little, but it also meant that the person behind you wouldn’t feel the pain of your recline. To make up for the legroom loss, Cathay relocated the seatback pocket to be under the seat so that gave back some legroom.

Great, right? Not so much. In fact, I continued to get about a comment a month on the blog about how horrible these seats are with the most recent one coming in earlier this week. Here are some of the highlights of the pain these seats have caused.

It doesn’t recline – it slides you into the seat in front. Since my knees are touching teh seat in front to start with, this leaves me with nowhere to go – other than the chiropractor when I get off.

The new seat is terrible: the seat recline, but not the headset!!!
So your head stays vertical all along.
Which means that your head falls forwards when you fall asleep.

Really ergonomically speaking, it just forces you into a slouch, with your spine bending into itself. This might be bearable for a short flight but is unforgivable for these long hauls.

It’s been since says since I got back from my HKG to NYC flight and my BACK STILL HURTS.

But then as the flight progressed the 10mm of padding on the seats became the real problem and I had very uncomfortable pressure points on my back.

I will be increasing my travel to Asia (3-4 times per year) and I will NEVER fly Cathay again unless/until these seats are recognized for the huge mistake they are and are removed. This fiasco is worthy of a case study in business school on the same bonehead level as “New Coke”

Seen enough? These seats appear to be the worst things ever invented, according to those who flew in them. And now, they’re finally, mercifully going to be put out to pasture. Actually, maybe some of the torture museums around the world can get some copies to scare tall people. In reality, they’ll just be going into shorter haul aircraft, so the pain won’t be nearly as noticeable.

This will also result in a new premium economy cabin as well as a refresh to the fancy pants seats at the pointy-end of the plane. Kudos to Cathay for listening. Let’s hope they get better info from focus groups this time so they don’t have to replace the seats again in another couple years.

[Original Photo via Flickr user kevingessner]

Ok, so I didn’t actually take the new saddle seat for a test ride. I mean, it was a static display in the Airline Interiors Expo hall, but I did get to sit in it for awhile and check it out. The verdict? It’s absolutely uncomfortable, but I think it’s a great idea. Kudos to Aviointeriors for at least trying to come up with a solution that matches passenger demand. The only problem? I can’t see how this passes regulatory hurdles. So I suppose I should put those kudos on ice.

You’ve heard about this thing, right? Well, if not, take a look at this bad boy:

But that picture doesn’t really tell the story. Instead, take a look at this picture with me squeezing myself into the second row.

As you can see, I’ve got a wedgie like no other. Kind of like when I first went horizontal in an angled lie-flat seat. The seat itself isn’t very comfortable. It has no moving parts, so tall people are in real trouble. (You’d think they’d have an up and down function for tall people, but that adds parts and weight. They may need to rethink that.) It doesn’t recline either. There is a tray table, but good luck using it for anything. Oh, and the armrests are even narrower than in coach. That combined with the fact that the saddle seat pushes your legs sideways means you’ll have a very intimate experience with your next-door neighbor.

So, uh, what do I like about this? Well, there are a lot of people that just want cheap fares. This seat weighs a lot less than a regular seat (the goal is to get it under 5kg per seat) and it takes up a lot less space. So that means lower fares can mean higher profit. This seat has 23 inches of pitch, which means that it’s 23 inches from the front of one seat to the front of the next seat. Compare that to a roughly industry standard 31 inches, and you can fit a lot more in a space.

Let’s look at a Spirit A321. Spirit has roughly 30 to 31 inches of pitch, but let’s just assume it’s 31 inches for simplicity sake. Here’s what the back cabin would look like with the saddle seat.

Instead of 82 seats in the back cabin, you can probably squeeze 112 in. Pretty good, eh? But let’s put this another way. If Spirit needs to make $75 per seat on a given flight to break even today, adding the saddle seat in that back section could bring in the same amount of revenue at only $55 per seat. That’s a big difference for the passenger.

I don’t see this kind of seat as being the kind of thing most airlines would want, but even those that do wouldn’t outfit their entire cabins with this seat. Think of it as Economy Minus. (or, on United, Economy Minus Minus.) I could see low cost airlines with a large percentage of short haul flights looking to take advantage of this seat. Think of Spirit, Allegiant, Air Asia, and yes, Ryanair. If the price is right, people will do it. It’s the right fit for some airlines, and I imagine we’ll see someone try something similar at some point.

But there is one huge, ugly problem. Regulation. The Aviointeriors people said that they’ve been in touch with the regulatory bodies and they don’t foresee a problem, but I do. In particular, I wonder if these seats will be able to meet evacuation test rules which require everyone to be out of the plane within a certain amount of time. Also, the seatbelt wasn’t on the seat, but it rides really low over your legs. I think that may need to be changed. (I wish it had a harness to keep you from spilling over and prevent you from breaking your skull on the seat in front.)

But if they can get past the regulatory problems (and that’s a HUGE “if”) this seems like a great idea to me. I, however, will be happy to pay more for a real seat.

Well, well. It looks like the long-awaited reconfiguration of United’s 777s has begun and the first airplane will be put into service very soon. As I mentioned more than a year ago (to a healthy does of skepticism), these planes are coming out with a 3-3-3 configuration in economy instead of the 2-5-2 they have today. Once these planes are done, then the 777 will once again be desirable up front, unlike today.

I’ve heard from multiple people that the first plane is being reconfigured right now. When it comes out, there will be fewer premium seats and more in the back of the bus. Here’s a comparison versus what’s out there today:

This looks like a good configuration to me, and it’s roughly what had been discussed before. The increase in Economy Plus seating is a nice bonus, but these aren’t the only changes. I understand that there will now be regular 110 volt power outlets throughout the plane. This is a huge step for United since they have been lagging in the power department for ages. Each seat gets power in First and Business. In the back, there will be two outlets for every three seats, another good reason (on top of general standardization of seats) for having the 3-3-3 configuration.

There will also be new, updated screens throughout the airplane. Up front, it will be full audio/video on demand as is the case on the 767 and 747 today, but in the back, it’s a little less clear. I am holding out hope that there is audio/video on demand and not just looping movies, because that would be insane to install less than the industry standard these days. That being said, I understand that they will be looking at charging for premium movies. So maybe it will have looping channels for free and audio/video on demand will cost. That doesn’t really bother me that much as long as the AVOD option is there. [Update: United confirms that there will be audio/video on demand in all classes and there will be no charge.]

The only bad part about this? The transition. It’s gonna suck. When the configuration changes from 2-5-2 to 3-3-3, people who thought they had aisles could end up in the middle. Families could find themselves separated by the aisle. It could get really ugly, so I’m hoping that they do a good job of keeping these planes on dedicated routes.

I asked United to confirm what I had heard late on Friday, but I still have not received word one way or the other. If I hear back from them, I’ll update it here. [Update: United has now confirmed this. The only thing that's unclear is whether or not there will be a charge for entertainment in coach.]

[In an unrelated note, I'm experimenting with putting posts up earlier so that you east coast folks can get your fill in the morning. The emails will still be sent at the same time, but my hope is to schedule posts to go live on the site by 7a Eastern. We'll see how this goes.]

While some airlines are moving away from First Class, British Airways continues to embrace it. They’ve just rolled out the latest version of their First Class product, and it seems very, well, British. I like that about BA, even though I highly doubt I’ll ever sit in these seats.

I consider myself something of an Anglophile, so I like the traditional, stuffy British style, stiff upper lip and all. That’s why I was with Margaret Thatcher when she condemned those silly world tails. People want British Airways to be British. And when it comes to First Class, I want some of that traditional British service. Heck, you can put Mr Belvedere up there and I’d even be happy. So here’s what they’ve done.

If you know BA’s First Class, this seat will look fairly similar. In fact, the biggest difference is that, as you can see, Rachel Weisz is now included in the price of the ticket. This isn’t a Singapore-style suite where you’re completely and totally closed off from the world, so you and Rachel will have to be discreet. Some people may not be thrilled that they don’t have a closed-off suite, but for some reason, it really doesn’t bother me.

The one thing that really stands out is the window. I know that sounds dumb, but it’s incredible how much that impacts the cabin feel. Unfortunately, the BA stock photos don’t show the window very well, so I took the one that got closest. To see some great pics, go to Business Traveller’s coverage.

As you can see, they’ve put inside paneling that effectively eliminates the round window that we’ve all come to expect on an airplane. There are now blinds on bigger interior windows that, when closed, make you forget you’re on a plane. It’s a pretty cool effect in pictures. I can’t wait to see what it looks like on an airplane (undoubtedly as I’m turning right to go to a lesser class).

Some of the little touches are nice as well. For example, you’ll find a wardrobe in each seat so you can hang your clothes. There is also a leather-bound desk. Totally unnecessary, but then again, isn’t First Class in general?

The seat has been installed on a single 777 so far, but it sounds like it’ll be awhile before it starts going on to the rest of the fleet. Guess we’ll all just have to wait.

Delta may have lost over $1 billion in 2009, but that’s not stopping them from pushing forward on improving their product offerings. In fact, the day before they announced earnings, they also announced a slew of onboard improvements. I’m glad to see it, but there is still one glaring omission here.

Delta is now committing to putting lie flat seats on all 777, 767, and 747 aircraft that fly internationally. That’s great news, because right now it’s a crapshoot on some of these fleets. The 777 LR aircraft have flat beds but the ERs don’t. The 767-400s have some with flat beds but others don’t and the 767-300s don’t. Now all 777s will have the same flat bed while all the 767s will have an alternate flat bed. I think it’s time to break out my old chart, updated with this news:

The big question (literally) is what they’ll put on the 747. They haven’t picked which seat they’ll use, but I’m sure it’ll be completely different from the 767 and 777 just to make things confusing. After all, the cabin width dictated that they use different beds in the 777 than the 767, so I don’t see why that wouldn’t impact the 747 decision as well.

The A330s will apparently still have the old Northwest WorldBusiness seats, and the 757s will keep the old Delta Biz Elite seats. But what about those CRJ-700s?

Ok, so those likely won’t be the exact seats, but Delta is installing First Class on 66 CRJ-700 aircraft operated by Connection carriers. This is undoubtedly meant to compete with United’s ExPlus and American’s recent decision to do the same on its CRJ-700s. These planes are flying more and more longer, former mainline routes so they need something to reward the elites, I suppose.

But what are they doing for the back of the bus? First and most importantly, the 747s and the 767-300s will have audio/video on demand installed at each seat. I assume this is a cost savings, because it gets expensive to pay for the monkeys that actually sit in the projector and run the movie on the big screen today. There is already AVOD in coach on the rest of the international fleet, so that will now be standard.

They’ll also be putting Delta’s blue leather seats on the Northwest fleet (eh, I like cloth) in coach, and more importantly, they’ll be installing the bigger overhead bins on Northwest’s 757s so you can fit rollerbags straight in.

Anything else? Yeah, they’re going to renovate the SkyClub at LAX and open new clubs in Seattle, Philly, and Indianapolis. The Philly one surprises me, but the Indy and Seattle ones don’t. This will be the only lounge in Indy, so that’s nice, and it’s a sign that they aren’t planning on abandoning the city as a little Heartland focus operation. With in-laws in Indy, I’m happy about that.

What’s the one big piece that I said they were missing at the beginning of this post? No word on JFK terminal upgrades. Seriously, this needs to happen. I shot off a question to Delta after seeing nothing regarding New York and they assured me that I’ll be notified as soon as something is ready to announce. You’ll know as soon as I do.