Regional jet salesmen must have cringed at the recent negative press surrounding passenger complaints about the lack of room in RJ cabins. What with all the good news about profits and traffic growth, the traveling public’s recognition that comfort must often take a back seat to seat-mile costs tossed a sour note into the industry’s chorus of praise for the anointed saviors of small- and medium-sized communities.
But after 9/11, the domain of 50-seat regional jets began reaching well beyond the one-and-a-half-hour flights generally accepted as the boundaries of their comfort zone. Today, of course, they more often fly half-way across the country, on routes once reserved for full-size mainline jets–often to the irritation of frequent travelers accustomed to what they once considered a minimum standard of space.
A March 22 Knight Ridder article published in a number of local U.S. newspapers documented a frequent business traveler’s experience on a Continental Express Embraer ERJ-145 flight from Indianapolis to Houston. “Less than an hour into the flight, I’ve got my knees in somebody’s back. The guy’s trying to recline, but can’t and thinks the seat is broken,” said 26-year-old Nate Geurkink. “I mean, I can literally feel my knee in the guy’s back. There’s nothing in between except two aluminum rails, a little padding and some cloth.”
