I don't really see why all the seats have to be bigger though, since the vast majority people do fit (uncomfortably, but still). Why not just have a few bigger, and correspondingly more expensive seats, and require that people who don't fit into economy buy them?

A better solution would perhaps be to have a few somewhat-wider-but-a-bit-more-expensive seats, available to everyone but mandatory for anyone who will not fit in a normal seat for some reason

Someone suggested somewhere on this page the idea of bench seating. I think that's fantastic. I don't know how to implement it and how you'd charge for it.

Air New Zealand is on the right path with their SkyCouch. However, as a relatively average sized woman with a tall, gangly husband who regularly flies from the…

I'm sorry you've dealt with the struggles you're facing but to tell someone you can 'buy him 4 times over' and brag about how many women you take home is in poor taste.
It is possible he was just trying to provide options. But I suppose once you have a chip on your shoulder all other contact will be filtered through…

I'm 5'8" and a size 14 (heavy point at the moment :( )... I've flown extensively for years and have always fit into seats from size 8 to size 16 (even heavier moment). Who are all of this 'thin, tiny' people who get their knees smashed and can't fit into seats?
I think people are confusing comfort with fit. Airline…

Well, I'm 5'10" and about 180 lbs, though my weight has ranged from about 150 to 230, and everywhere in-between. And I've never been what I would call "uncomfortable" in a seat. I'm not expecting much in the way of comfort from coach, obviously, but I've never felt squished. (And no, I'm also not one of those…

It seems they do fit the majority, though. Perhaps not comfortably, but as one person said, when you're flying economy class, you're purposely not paying for big seats because you either (a) can't afford it, or (b) don't think it's worth it.

The first time I ever flew was in 2002. I weighed 376lbs and was heading to a hospital to meet a surgeon for a gastric bypass because I had literally exhausted all my options. The airport to the city I was going to was terribly small as was the airport (or they both could have seemed small because of how LARGE I was)…

So we expand the width of the seats, and expand the legroom between rows..... then the people who fit into the current seats will wind up paying twice as much for a big seat because the airline has boost up the ticket price, for the sake of your dignity. That sounds completely fair!

And that is a perfectly valid point. If you pay for a seat, you should be the only one in said seat. Period. I am not a petite person myself but I dont feel that my size or anything else about me gives me the right to take something that isnt mine.

I always appreciate it when they rub their legs on mine. I tried to ignore the guy doing that on my last flight to Australia and after two glasses of wine, I finally pulled my knee away quickly and then swung it back so it cracked into his leg. He stopped.

While I agree that normal airline seats should probably be larger, at what point do you think they should stop making them larger? A huge amount of people in the US are obese... how about those who are "morbidly obese", people who could easily take up more than 2x the amount of space that a non-overweight person of…

I don't want to insult the passengers sitting next to me, but I paid for my seat as well and I deserve to use it as I please.

I had a similar experience on an overseas flight. I was condemned to a middle seat between two large people. I'm trying to say this as diplomatically as possible: there wasn't room for me. These two people should have shared three seats, but they were forced to sit for 10 hours with another human squashed between…

The point I'm trying to make is that a regulatory agency has to step because at some point we're all going to be unable to squeeze into those seats. And the airline does have a duty to ensure the comfort of all its passengers instead of prioritizing profit all the time. That's the underlying theme here.

It's not just a size issue though, it's a weight issue too. Weight costs fuel, the more weight you have the more fuel you use. Airlines aren't just charging people for an extra seat when they don't fit, they're making them pay for the fuel too. Which kind of makes sense.

Well... all of my friends are getting married this year, and I am overly single. I will likely have all married bridesmaids.

That's silly. Why shouldn't I have supported my best friends on their day simply because I already had mine? Bridesmaids should be people close to you, not just random singles you managed to dig up.

It's weird that you find wedding culture—including the tradition of having unwed ladies as bridesmaids—to be nauseating. Yet you apparently disapprove of deviating from that tradition by having a married friend as a bridesmaid.

I was a married bridesmaid twice. And my sister-in-law was a "groom's maid" at my wedding. Marriage and weddings are already weird enough. No reason not to break free from the mold.