Cranky on the Web (May 18 – 23)

Embraer 190, LAX - Los Angeles

Monday is Memorial Day, so I’m taking the day off. I’ll be back with a regular post on Tuesday.

LAX Construction and Inconveniences: What You Need to KnowConde Nast Daily Traveler
I liked my original proposal for the title, LAX is Happening (If “Happening” Means Starting Majorly Annoying Construction)

Embraer Sees More Jet Sales With Big Bag Space: Corporate BrazilBloomberg
Embraer says its revised Embraer 170/190 family of jets will let people store a carry on bag. Bloomberg asked me for my opinion. (It’s a big deal, and people will love it.)

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5 comments on “Cranky on the Web (May 18 – 23)

  1. Makes you wonder what life would be like of airplanes did away with overhead bins except for a net to hold coats and hats like in the old days. Wouldn’t that just freak out some people who only had under the seat to use and everything had to be checked.

    1. You mean like most typical long distance buses do currently? Yeah, that would annoy a lot of people. Then again, on the other extreme, you have the old “luggage at hand” Soviet system, though that is (arguably) not THAT different from gate-checking large carryon bags at RJs, like most RJ operators do today.

  2. David, I would have no problem with that, if they also went back to their policy of allowing 2 free checked bags like they did in that era.

  3. I have flown in both the Embraer 170 and 190. Same plane but the 190 was a bit longer and held more passengers. Excellent customer experience with wide comfortable seats and less pax per row. The overhead lockers were spacious but the latch mechanism was poorly designed, with many locking prior to being fully closed, and then banging them closed did not work. Attendants had to use fingernails to flick something in the mechanism to “reset” many of the latches “open” so that the locker doors could be closed more vigorously on first attempt and therefore latch properly.

    Virgin Australia flew both E170’s and E190’s on regional domestic routes. Last year they gave back the 170’s and stopped buying any more 190’s because despite excellent customer appeal, they were not fuel efficient (especially the 170’s which used just as much fuel as the 190’s but carried less passengers). Virgin replaced the 170’s by going back to use of slower, less spacious, more noisy, and less popular, turbo-prop aircraft. As a result, I no longer give strong preference to using Virgin, and I now use either them or Qantas Dash 8’s, which ever has the better schedule or price.

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