
Letting slower passengers board airplane first is faster, study finds - pseudolus
https://arstechnica.com/science/2020/01/letting-slower-passengers-board-airplane-first-really-is-faster-study-finds/
======
scott_s
I'm also convinced that we _exit_ the plane in the worst way possible. We
basically do it row-by-row: as the people in front of them leave, people in a
row get up, get their bags, start walking down the line, and this cascades up
the plane. The problem is that there is very little parallelism: while people
in the next row to leave are getting their bags, no one is exiting the plane.

This is similar to a stall in a processor pipeline. We want to avoid stalls,
which mean that we want people exiting the plane constantly. A _column_
approach would work much better: people in the aisle get their bags before the
doors open, and start leaving as soon as it does. As columns drain, the next
column can get their bags and start to leave. This approach keeps people
leaving constantly, while also keep the aisle constantly populated. Yes, the
person in the last column in the back row still leaves last, but I claim they
will leave sooner. (edit: Thinking about it more, I actually think the people
in the last column in the _front_ row leave last. If you're in the back row,
second column, you can stand up as soon as the person in the first column in
front of you has started walking out. After the first column to leave, people
will exit in reverse order because the openings will appears back-to-front.
Trying to maintain front-row "fairness" will just result in a period of time
where no one is in the aisle.)

The reason we do the row-by-row method, I think, is that our sense of fairness
is influenced by who we're looking at and proximity. We look forward, and we
feel that the people closer to the door "should" leave first because they're
closer, and we're looking at them, so we feel bad if we hold them up. But by
doing the row-by-row method, we're holding up everyone _behind us_ , but we
don't look at them as much.

I don't know how to enforce a column-by-column exit. Airlines can enforce how
we get on the plane because they control, person at a time, who enters the
plane. How we exit the plane is more cultural, and while an airline could
certainly try to ask people to exit this way, it's much harder to make it
happen.

~~~
jaywalk
I was on a flight a year or two ago where, upon landing, a woman turned her
phone on and received a call informing her that her brother had passed away.
She was understandably quite distraught as we taxied to the gate, and the lead
flight attendant even made an announcement asking everyone to please remain
seated so that she could exit the plane first.

Nobody listened.

~~~
jbigelow76
_...the lead flight attendant even made an announcement asking everyone to
please remain seated so that she could exit the plane first.

Nobody listened._

I find myself with a case of both sider-ism on this. One the one hand (the
hand that really should win out), we should all be able to act as decent
empathetic people with the instruction following capabilities of a 7 year old
when the situation dictates. But on the other hand, when you treat (and pack)
your customers like a bunch of damn cattle, don't be surprised when they act
like a bunch of damn cattle.

~~~
oarabbus_
Sure, the legroom is considerably lacking in economy class. But aside from
that (a small price to pay for a trip that would otherwise take days to
months, no?) what makes you call being on a flight being like "damn cattle"?

>But on the other hand, when you treat (and pack) your customers like a bunch
of damn cattle, don't be surprised when they act like a bunch of damn cattle.

~~~
asdff
I don't get the gripe with leg room, unless you are oddly shaped. I'm 6' and I
don't care about leg room or leaning back, because in every flight you can
just push your bag under your seat and stretch your legs fully under the seat
ahead of you.

I find a 5 hour flight more comfortable than 3 hour sporting event on an
aluminum bleacher.

~~~
Al-Khwarizmi
Well, no wonder you don't get it, you have a pretty typical height. 10 or 15
cm make a _huge_ difference in terms of seat legroom, especially taking into
account that it's a well-known fact that tall people have a larger leg to
torso ratio, i.e., most of the difference between an average and a tall
individual is in leg length.

I'm 197 cm (between 6'5" and 6'6") and not only it's totally impossible for me
to stretch my legs under the front seat, but in some airlines there is just no
position for me in standard economy seats that won't physically hurt. When I
fly for leisure, I pay to get more legroom, or just don't go. But since when I
fly for work some silly regulations prevent me from paying for extra legroom,
the first day after a longish flight I typically walk around limping.

~~~
lb1lf
-See your doctor.

I am 6'8" and had the same issue with my employer - as a cost-cutting measure
it was decided that anybody but C-level would fly economy, period.

A quick visit to my doctor (who, I should add, is 6'6" or so and as such
understands the issue) resulted in a letter stating that physical discomfort
aside, there was a very real chance that I might develop health issues from
spending a few hundred hours[0] a year in such a cramped position - deep vein
thrombosis most notably.

Problem solved. No way they were going to risk acting against medical advice
and later be confronted with it.

Short haul I couldn't care less where I sit, but if I am to stay in a seat for
several hours, it had better be reasonably comfortable.

[0] At the time, this was not an exaggeration.

------
Reedx
CGP Grey has a great video examining different boarding methods and why some
are slower or faster than others:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oAHbLRjF0vo](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oAHbLRjF0vo)

Also noting that the way we deplane (front to back) is the slowest method,
heh.

~~~
virtuous_signal
Great video. This is one of those phenomena, like how to fix traffic jams,
that everyone has an opinion on because of firsthand experience, but few
people know about the actual research on. Despite there being known fast
methods, I think 2 things stand in the way of implementing them:

1) Business and 1st class make a lot of money for airlines. Not letting them
board first (although personally I've always wondered why this is desirable)
would devalue their tickets and make less profit for the airline.

2) Airplanes have to undergo certain maintenance checks or procedures whenever
they land. Those take some fixed amount of time. There is no incentive to
speed up the boarding/deplaning process past that fixed amount of time, since
it won't be the limiting factor.

~~~
wtvanhest
One option that isnt discussed is having the overhead bins be seperately
ticketed and a box. So if you want a bin, you pay $40 and one gets asigned to
you. It would streamline boarding because people would put their stuff in the
bin and be done.

~~~
reaperducer
Until they don't, and then the air hostesses who are just trying to get
everyone seated have to become policemen as well. They have enough to do.

~~~
njarboe
Not really any different than having assigned seats for people.

------
StillBored
The conclusions are pretty obvious, I guess they just needed to simulate it?

The fastest boarding I've ever experienced was something Cathay Pacific did a
few years ago. In the boarding area they had three lines with a bunch of
section signs and an a couple employees hassling/sorting people between the
lines. The rear of the plane sections were at the front of the line. I'm
guessing they were just counting how many people were in each section?

Either way, when they opened the doors, they just picked one of the lines and
the employees walked down the line scanning everyone's boarding pass and then
the whole line proceeded to board the 777 (dual isle). Then they repeated the
process with the next line after a short pause.

Which works out to back to front boarding of 1/6th of the passengers in a
section at a time. When it was my turn the entire line pretty much just walked
onto the plane bumped around a bit in the section and sat down.

Quite a shock given the hour long boarding AA can sometimes pull off with
their messed up boarding order based on miles and cabin front to back...

~~~
reaperducer
The fastest boarding I experienced was years ago somewhere in Asia (Singapore,
maybe), where three lines boarded through three doors: Two on the terminal
side, and one on the far side.

I was in the far-side group, and we had to hike up a lot of stairs and then
through a jetway, presumably over the aircraft (hard to know with no windows),
and then down a bunch of stairs and then enter the aircraft, where we could
see people boarding from the other side.

Very fast, except for the long hike. But this was before people put everything
and the kitchen sink into over-sized carry-ons, so it wasn't arduous.

~~~
komali2
> put everything and the kitchen sink into over-sized carry-ons

Which they only do because free checked is going away. You get what you
optimize for, after all.

IMO people pack way too much shit traveling anyway, but I'm sure here most are
familiar with the onebag concept. I've no way to convince someone other than
actually going on a trip with them and happily walking next to them while they
drag their wheeled luggage around.

~~~
JoshTriplett
> Which they only do because free checked is going away.

I pack everything in one piece of carry-on luggage, and I'd do that even if
checked luggage were free (which it often is).

It means I don't have to take extra time or wait in a line to check a bag at
the source airport, I don't have to take time at baggage claim at the
destination airport (just walk straight from the gate to ground
transportation), and I don't have any risk of losing my luggage (or having it
badly repacked after a search, or having something go missing).

~~~
wutbrodo
Yup, I haven't checked a bag in a decade and have been consistently baffled by
my friends that do; this decade was roughly my 20s, so it excludes a lot of
the good reasons for checked bags like physical limitations or young
children). Who wants to deal with checkin lines upon boarding (and get to the
airport that much earlier), then get off of an international flight and wait
an arbitrarily long time for your bags, with an unreasonably high chance of
them having been lost?

~~~
reaperducer
One reason, from my 20's, since you declared that parameter: The sort of
clothing one wears to a cultural event doesn't fit in a carry-on. There's no
way I was going to show up for an opera in Vienna or a symphony in Prague in
jeans and a drip-dry t-shirt.

~~~
wutbrodo
This isn't true at all, in my experience. I've been on multi-leg trips that
included weddings and formal events as well as beach time, which meant packing
formal shoes and clothing (in a couple cases a full suit) along with enough
t-shirts to deal with the humidity of a beach, shorts, flip-flops, trunks,
etc. My 40L backpack has so far been accepted as carry-on in 15+ different
countries, and I carry a small tote bag[1] for overflow/on-the-plane items
(usually laptop+book, but occasionally shoes). Hell, right know I'm visiting
some (lovably) stodgy family in the old country, which means I have to pack
formal clothing for the inevitable trips to the country club and various
events... And I spent a few days on the beach in Thailand right before this. I
was able to do all of this while carrying half a dozen gifts that took up
probably 30% of my bag.

Your comment just reinforces my bafflement and my impression that people
subject themselves to checked baggage because they've simply never bothered to
look into the alternative. I'm sure there are many people for whom checking a
bag works out fine, but the bafflement comes from the many people (including
some I know personally) who hate the hassle but haven't gotten around to
trying carry-on-only travel.

[1] It's the New Yorker tote bag, in case anyone is familiar with the
dimensions

------
whiddershins
You know what I think is weird about all this discussion?

Boarding and deplaning really don’t take that long, most of the time.

Think 15 or 20 minutes max.

It’s one of those things where it feels incredibly long and arduous. It feels
interminable. But that has something (IMO) more to do with the psychological
experience of flying.

The actual time cost is fairly small, especially compared to so many other
wastes of your time when flying (getting to the airport on crowded roads,
requirements to arrive early, arriving early because of fear of security
taking a long time, getting through security, requirements to get to the gate
early, sitting in the plane at the gate, sitting on the plane waiting to take
off, sitting on the plane on the other end, possibly being on a shuttle bus
connecting plane to gate, waiting for luggage, waiting for cab or shuttle or
rental car ...) not to mention the time of the actual flight.

~~~
wutbrodo
I think it's just that it's unpleasant time in comparison to all those other
things, so it's more ripe for optimization. When I fly, I read or relax or run
errands on the train or Uber, breeze through checkin due to not checking
luggage, stroll through security and customs due to Global Entry, relax at the
gate and do whatever I'd like, and am generally well-prepared to get some
reading done or relax on the plane. The only parts of the process where I
can't focus (or get lost in my thoughts) are checkin and security, which are
already pretty tightly optimized.

By contrast, boarding and deplaning is a particularly uncomfortable form of
hurry-up-and-wait, where your mind isn't your own because you need to keep one
eye/ear on your surroundings, and you're standing with your luggage and
shuffling forward at random intervals.

It's no surprise that people don't consider time spent boarding/deplaning the
same as time (eg) at the gate, and that obvious inefficiencies are
particularly rankling.

I tried to paint a vivid picture of the differences, but the truth is I don't
personally mind boarding/deplaning too much, for some reason. I just
understand where the focus comes from.

------
alkonaut
If airlines really wanted to speed up boarding they should stop offering free
carry on but charge for checked in luggage. Ryanair realized this now and for
their cheapest category you aren’t allowed to put luggage in the overhead bins
(or rather, the ticket allows only bags that fit under the seat in front).

As for boarding, airlines should have staff in the plane shoving people into
the rows with their coats on and their carryons in their laps. Better yet,
they should have signs in the gate instructing people to have their coats in
their hands and not on them (just like the TVs at security). Once everyone is
in the cabin, people can get up and use the overhead bins without blocking the
aisle.

~~~
jstimpfle
> they should stop offering free carry on but charge for checked in luggage

I tripped while reading here. It reads to me like "stop offering free carry on
COMMA but charge" of which I couldn't make sense. Suggestion, "stop offering
free carry on, and charge..."

------
kyllo
This reminds me of the book The Goal by Eli Goldratt. It's fictional, but
there's a story about a boy scout troop that goes on a hike, and there's an
overweight kid named Herbie who hikes the slowest. The troop leader teaches
everyone that the entire group as a whole will reach the top faster (and stay
together) if they keep Herbie in the front.

When you have a bottleneck step in your process, the whole end-to-end process
will run the most smoothly if everything else matches pace with the
bottleneck.

~~~
lonelappde
Did you work at Amazon? It's a cult classic hazing ritui there. Managers tell
reports to read it and then joke about terrible a novel it wrapped around a
few cute stories like that one and the paperclip passing game.

~~~
kyllo
Ha! No, Microsoft--I was in the hardware supply chain group for a while, and
The Goal was a common conversation topic there. I heard a few people call
process bottlenecks "Herbies."

------
cryptonector
Airlines don't just sell the tickets. They sell convenience and comfort. And
they have to mediate a limited resource shared by passengers: overhead bin
space. So they want premium customers to get dibs on overhead bin space, which
means letting them board first. The slowest part of boarding sometimes is the
tail (economy and late-arrivals) looking for bin space, or worse, having to
bring their carry-on back to the door for gate checking.

To make boarding faster the airlines will first have to commit to not letting
economy passengers have carry-on. Until they are willing to do this, there
will be no improvement.

~~~
MereInterest
> And they have to mediate a limited resource shared by passengers: overhead
> bin space.

If only there were other places that luggage could be stored. Somewhere for
larger bags that aren't needed during the flight. Somewhere that could be
loaded independently of the passenger door. If such a place existed, airlines
could give incentives to have passengers place baggage there instead of
overhead.

Or airlines could do the exact opposite, charge extra for the less convenient
method, and slow down the boarding process as a result.

~~~
cryptonector
I'm a frequent flyer. I'll pay extra for carry-on space if need be (and I do,
_every time_ , even when flying airlines where I have no frequent flyer
status). Checking luggage for me means: risking loss/theft, spending extra
time (money) checking it and then waiting for it at the carousel. I often fly
with two laptops and I don't want to make my backpack too heavy, but also I
don't want to check either laptop.

------
pnw_hazor
Often, especially if I have checked baggage, I wait until the bitter end
rather than getting onboard early or waiting in line. If there is no room for
my roller-bag, gate checking is usually free.

~~~
sjg007
I've seen this optimization. It makes more sense for the airline to just have
free checked bags and charge a premium for a carry on. I think one issue is
that they don't want the commotion at the gate check. I saw an airport pre-
screener once tell a guy his carry on was too big and the dude was livid. This
wasn't TSA and the guy wasn't an airline employee either.. I think he was just
working for the airport. I would've been livid too.

------
joe_the_user
So the boarding problem is complex optimization problem for the airlines but
with various paradoxical qualities.

A) Airlines benefit from having tiered costs for tickets because their ideal
situation is having minimal costs but charging each customer what the customer
is willing to pay.

B) But of course, reducing total load times reduces the time planes spend on
the ground. This isn't just reducing travel time but also reducing the number
of planes the airline needs to take N passengers to their destination.
Obviously, airlines care about their own time-costs more than the passenger's
time costs - why the airline briskly takes their passenger to some out of the
way hub and then has the passenger wait five hours of their own time.

So between these factors you get a pretty complex problem. That thing is that
when you get into such complexity, the best strategy can be nothing more than
incremental, greedy optimization. IE, it's surprising complex "best
approaches" aren't being tried here.

------
jc__denton
Deplaning always feels slower to me. You usually get an announcement about
twenty minutes before touchdown that you're inbound. I notice virtually nobody
prepares during or after this announcement. If I took anything out of the
overhead, I re-stow it and get the small items I have together. When we land,
I turn off airplane mode, put my phone in my pocket, grab my backpack and am
ready to go. Others like to eat a snack, make a phone call, examine every
possible object in their bag, and do just about everything _but_ exit the
plane. Like seriously, do that in the terminal when you're not a blocker on
others exiting the aircraft.

As a bigger guy, I scowl at people wanting to remove overhead bins. I'd rather
put my bag there and have the space under the seat for my legs. Airlines need
to understand the more uncomfortable they make the flights, the more likely I
am to take a train.

------
ryandrake
I always thought it would be best to let the window seats board first, ordered
back to front to minimize waiting for stowing baggage, then middle seats back
to front, then aisle seats back to front. Families traveling together would
obviously complain, but it would probably get the plane boarded much faster
overall.

~~~
ken
CGP Grey addresses this in the video (commented elsewhere here). This strategy
minimizes the Seat Shuffle, but it turns out that isn't the major slowdown
when boarding, so overall this is only slightly faster than boarding in random
order.

------
doh
I would like to see the carry-on to go away. I understand the consequences
would be quite harsh at first, but I do believe the airports and airlines
would eventually figure out better ways to handle luggage and we would all be
better for it.

~~~
hocuspocus
I can't find a lot of information online, but I remember an airline employee
telling me that the "P90 SLA" for handling baggage at big European airports is
20 minutes.

I don't think there's a lot of room for improvement, let alone a dramatic
increase of the volume of checked baggage.

~~~
doh
The improvement doesn't need to come only just in form of time to luggage but
also in the experience for offloading and pickup it up. Also reliability is
quite an issue (if you ever flew through CDG you know what I'm talking about).

I would like to see some more innovation around luggage handling.

------
bproven
The fastest boarding and deplaning I have experienced is at Burbank airport.
It is done with 2 open doors: front and rear - rather than just 1 door
boarding only front to rear.

I'm sure it is the same at other small airports as well...

~~~
sjg007
Do you exit to the tarmac or did they have two jetways? Two jetways make sense
but you need the plane to come in horizontally. Might be a good idea for new
airports.

~~~
bproven
exit to the tarmac

------
reportgunner
> _The researchers ended up with another counter-intuitive result: it 's
> actually 28 percent more efficient to let slower passengers board first._

So is it _faster_ or _more efficient_ ?

What if we have faster-only and slower-only planes ? Won't that be even FASTER
?

Also: > _This test was conducted in a mock Boeing 757 fuselage, located on a
Southern California soundstage, with 12 rows of six seats and a single aisle.
Five methods were tested using 72 passengers of various ages._

Is this really science or just a math excercise ?

------
chrisco255
It would be nice if they could also allow people to board and depart from the
front and back doors of the plane. I've done this from the tarmac on a
Frontier flight once in the South Terminal in Austin, and since you walk out
on the tarmac old-school style, they have two ramps for onloading and
offloading. Makes things much quicker. I don't know if the jet bridges could
be extended to allow for front and back door access, but it would be awesome
if it were possible.

~~~
adwww
Lots of European airports (including LHR) do this - air bridge to the front
door and steps to the back door.

------
jedberg
Southwest has sort of figured this out. First of all, they use random
boarding, which is almost the fastest, and the fastest of the viable options
(good luck getting people to board alternate rows).

They also interleave slow and fast passengers. They let handicapped people
board, then the first 1/3 of passengers, then families with kids, and then the
rest of the passengers.

By the last 1/3 of the passengers, it's mostly center seats, which means high
parallelism for those passengers.

~~~
ajmurmann
"good luck getting people to board alternate rows" Do you know right now if
boarding group D is people from the back of the plane, people with window
seats or odd rows?

~~~
jedberg
Not sure which method each airline uses but the problem is that all of them
let their premier members board first regardless of seat, and they let groups
board together regardless of boarding group, so it screws the whole thing up.

------
throwaheyy
The US airlines’ system of roughly allowing people to board in the order
corresponding to how much they pay (with up to 9 distinct groups) looks a
little silly now.

~~~
kmonsen
If you are the airline it seems to work out since you are actually turning
this into a money making opportunity?

The real issue is if the slow boarding is costing the airline more than the
money than they earn from charging from upgrades. Also consider that the
people paying for expensive seats might be sad if they don't get to board
early which again might affect airline revenue.

I think airlines is pretty happy with the current situation, and that the
passenger boarding speed is not costing them money so this is all good. This
is just an (somewhat educated?) guess.

~~~
throwaheyy
The thing is, people are not paying extra just to board early, they're mostly
paying for the bigger seat, more space, more personal service. The "priority
boarding" is just icing on the cake, a "cable channels package" tactic thrown
in to make the customer feel like they're not getting ripped off as much.
Assuming that boarding is not in the critical path, airlines could adopt a
faster boarding system and get the plane turned around faster without turning
down that extra revenue.

~~~
lonelappde
Unless you are in first class,. boarding early is _worse_ \-- it's more time
on the plane

~~~
kmonsen
If you are in first class you can do whatever you want and the airline will
politely thank you. At least this is my experience when flying business or
first class.

In general, the airline lets you board at your time _or later_

------
whatgoodisaroad
This discussion always seems to me like such a tunnel-vision engineering
mindset. Airlines are companies, they don't optimize for boarding throughout,
they're optimizing for revinue. If they can charge more for a ticket that
exempts you from a poorly-throughput-optimized boarding procedure, they'd
better make sure it's poorly optimized.

------
sjg007
The real problem is the carry on. Checked bags should be free. A carry on
bigger than a small backpack should be expensive.

~~~
flukus
I'd like to enforce a rule that if it has wheels then you obviously can't
carry it and it's not a carry on.

------
chrisgd
I would think the only thing that really matters is time to stow carry one.
Everyone has a carry on, then late groups are asked to check it but everyone
wants to see with their own eyes that there is no space or people put their
roller in flat, when it clearly states to turn it on its side in newer planes
with drop down overhead space.

------
hokkos
Just design plane to facilitate boarding like this prototype :

[https://images.vinted.net/thumbs/f800/046b0_M2bQ3jAEBTnELEZ6...](https://images.vinted.net/thumbs/f800/046b0_M2bQ3jAEBTnELEZ6GLxS9ig9.jpeg?1570701097-c34e8d578d26ff8f6878b245b34d0265da700366)

------
daxfohl
How about everyone deposits their carry on bags on carts in the gate waiting
area, of the exact dimensions at the overhead bins. Then workers transfer them
to the overhead compartments while cleaning crew is working. Finally everyone
takes their seats without fuss.

~~~
duderific
Cool idea. Wouldn't the carry-on bags be all over the plane though, and not
necessarily anywhere near where you're sitting? De-planing in that scenario
would be a nightmare.

There would need to be a separate system to mark your carry on bag with your
seat number, so it could be in the bin relatively close to where you're
sitting.

~~~
daxfohl
I was thinking the carts would be numbered just like the overhead bins. So the
bags would be transferred exactly as you stowed them. _Maybe_ even make the
bins detachable so it's just "roll them aboard and snap them in". Though that
could be heavy/unsafe/whatever.

I think it would unquestionably make boarding more efficient. Though thinking
about it more I don't know if it would make it _better_ , since it's now yet
another extra thing that you have to do.

~~~
sjg007
Too complicated. A gate is run by 1 or 2 people max.

------
rcthompson
They mention that boarding even rows first and then odd rows is also an
improvement, but I've wondered whether 2 is actually the right periodicity. If
we suppose a row consists of 6 people with roller bags, what we really want is
to ensure that all 6 of these people can occupy the aisle without blocking
anyone else from their row. So what if we used 10 instead of 2? I.e. first
board everyone whose row number ends in 0 back to front, then everyone whose
row ends in 1, then 2, and so on.

(I assume you could do even better by boarding window seats first, then
middle, then aisle, but keeping rows together is much more family/group-
friendly.)

------
mlthoughts2018
I want them to just tilt the jet bridge down at a 75 degree angle through a
hole in the roof of the plane, and then similarly tilt the cabin down at a 75
degree angle through a hole in the terminal roof when you land.

------
lkbm
Related: CGPGray made a great video about boarding methods:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oAHbLRjF0vo](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oAHbLRjF0vo)

------
discobean
They should have people board a plane shaped capsule/container before, then
when the plane is ready they push/dock the capsule/container into the body of
the plane and you fly off.

------
dublin
That the "Herbies" should be in front comes as no surprise to anyone who's
read Eli Goldratt's book, "The Race" \- A book that transformed modern
manufacturing methods toward the end of the 20th century. Of course, it was
published way back in the dark ages of the 1980's so there's not a single
reference to it here in the HN discussion - kind of a surprising ignorance in
a supposedly learned crowd...

------
drewg123
The problem with the boarding process is luggage. What airlines should do
would be to make a checked bag free, and charge for overhead-bin use. That
will reduce the boarding time by reducing the time to find bin space and stow
luggage.

I suspect that airlines don't have an option to try this, because they all
have co-branded credit card deals and frequent flier programs where some of
the perks are free checked bags. I imagine that their credit card partners
would not be happy about them devaluing the card by removing bag fees.

~~~
bdamm
Also they won't do this because business flyers usually don't check bags. That
way they won't be lost (by the airline) and so control over their destiny is
retained by the flyer. I've done quite a few international trips, even week
long trips, without checked luggage. Having your luggage get lost can be a
real time consuming hassle and one you don't want to deal with when on a
business trip.

~~~
drewg123
Yes, agreed. I'm a business traveler, and I'm happy to pay extra to carry on
if I have to.

------
russdill
There's a lot of focus on improving boarding times. But I haven't seen any
attempts to improve deplaning. It's always via the slowest possible method.

~~~
leetcrew
I'm guessing this is because the airlines feel it's easier to enforce boarding
procedures than deplaning. hardly anyone is going to charge the gate to board
out of order, but once the plane has arrived at it's destination, people want
to stand up and get off as soon as they get a chance.

~~~
reaperducer
_hardly anyone is going to charge the gate to board out of order_

Really? I see this all the time.

You can especially see it on airlines that have signs for group lines labeled
1-5 permanently displayed at the gate. As soon as the announcement goes out
that the boarding process will begin shortly, a dozen people from Groups 4 and
5 will rush to their lines.

I've never understood this. I just sit back and relax until the mayhem calms
down and then I just stroll on at the back of my group.

We all leave at the same time, so what's the rush? Then again, I don't ever
travel with just a carry-on bag.

~~~
leetcrew
just my experience. I only fly Southwest, and as far as I can tell, people
trying to board significantly out of order get scolded by the gate attendant
and sent back to their place in line. swa is first-come first-served seating
though, and they charge extra for low boarding pass numbers, so it might be a
bigger deal to them.

~~~
lostapathy
Which airport? I've never seen a southwest gate attendant do this, or reject
oversized carry on bags. It's really frustrating.

------
shadow-banned
Priority boarding is now being used by most airlines as a class differentiator
- a perk you can add to paying for a Comfort + or Economy Plus or First Class
ticket.

------
mattwad
They should go back to offering free checked bags. I don't get why everyone
thinks we should remove carry-ons. People didn't haev so many carry-ons when
checking was free. If they really gave a damn to get us on faster, they would
board the back of the plane first. But then that means people who paid more
for their seat get on last. I always felt that the slowness just boils down to
greed on the airline's part.

~~~
sethammons
I check my carry on for free every time I fly. I tend to be on Alaska, United,
or Delta.

~~~
samatman
Which argues for the point you're replying to: why should an airline charge
money at the ticket counter for a service you can get for free at the gate?
It's perverse.

------
pseudolus
It would have been particularly interesting to see what would have happened
had the study concluded the opposite: that letting slower passengers board
first slows overall boarding. Which would have prevailed? Efficiency or the
common decency inherent in allowing children and individuals with infirmities
to board first?

~~~
majormajor
I don't understand why boarding first is desirable, except for scarcity of
overhead luggage space (heightened by checked bag fees and growing rollaboard
bags) and those few first class folks getting a free drink while they wait.

Fix the storage issue and I'd want to board last - don't extend my time in
those seats!

~~~
mcmoose75
Overhead bin space is the big reason- give the somewhat (last 5 years-ish)
changes to charging for the 1st checked bag, many who would have otherwise
checked a bag are bringing on as carry-ons.

Many flights I've been on in past several years have had a real shortage of
bin space, meaning getting on board early to make sure you're not the odd man
out IS important (waiting for baggage carousel can take an extra 45 minutes)

~~~
donarb
> waiting for baggage carousel can take an extra 45 minutes

A few years ago, Houston airport authorities dealt with complaints that it
took too long for travelers to get their bags after their flights. When the
airport was built, the bag pickup locations were very close to the arriving
gates, over time the airport got busier and people ended up waiting longer.

The fix was to move the pickup locations further from the arrival gates. This
didn't change the length of time that it took to pull the bags from the plane
and send them to the pickup location, but passengers noticed that their bags
always showed up within minutes of getting to the pickup area. They
essentially eliminated the waiting time by converting it into walking time.

~~~
mcmoose75
Aha- that's a good anecdote.

Regardless of the perceived/ actual waiting time, however, it's MUCH better
not to have to wait for a bag at all- going straight to curb or car rental and
skipping that step is the only way to fly.

------
asiachick
I'm sure this is has some obvious reasons but I find it interesting that Japan
can fill 800-1200 seats of the shinkansen in < 4 minutes

I get there are many differences, lots entrances, slightly wider isles. Still,
it's fun to think about what it would take to do the same on a plane.

~~~
Grue3
A train has less seats per door than a plane. Way less seats. It can also
start moving _before_ people have fully finished boarding (e.g. storing their
luggage in overhead compartment).

------
d--b
What's astounding is that so much effort goes into finding the best boarding
strategy, while really what airplane companies should be doing is collect the
hand luggage that is not going to be open during flight (90%+ of it), and pre-
load it somewhere else.

------
aaron695
Tip #3 -- Parents, never use the pre-board

[https://edition.cnn.com/travel/article/samantha-brown-
travel...](https://edition.cnn.com/travel/article/samantha-brown-travel-
tips/index.html)

------
davidw
As always, the best loading strategy is: get loaded at the airport bar. Flying
is stressful!

------
paparush
Boarding for the major US carriers is so broken. My solution - NO OVERHEAD
BAGS - period.

~~~
stanferder
Spirit Airlines actually has the right idea on this - you pay to bring an
overhead bag aboard, and they mean business about it being the proper size.
I'm able to get away with not checking a bag on the vast majority of my
flights. I'm out of the airport like 5 minutes after I exit the plane.

~~~
jfengel
Do you find that Spirit flights board and deplane faster? People struggling to
get overhead bags when I'm feeling very cramped and just want to leave is one
of my pet peeves.

~~~
stanferder
It seems faster than average. There are aspects to their service that are
horrible; their website, a la carte pricing and "buy your bags" terminology
are incomprehensible if you aren't already accustomed to it. But they're
cheap, quick and never even ordered any 737 Maxes.

------
redis_mlc
> While passengers all have reserved seats

Southwest doesn't resemble that, heh.

I mentioned that to an Indonesian person (you know, where all the airliner
accidents happen), and they puzzled over that for a minutes and said, "So ...
like a bus?" :)

------
zwilliamson
I don’t care about the speed of boarding. I get why airlines would though. I
care about overhead bin space. It would be interesting to see if “slow
boarders” also bring on more carry on luggage than average.

------
etxm
The MythBusters has an episode on plane boarding that was pretty interesting.

Results: [https://mythresults.com/airplane-
boarding](https://mythresults.com/airplane-boarding)

------
jhoechtl
As long as seats are allocated by boarding class and boarding class is
reflecting ticket price, no substantially better boarding / disembark pattern
will be implemented

------
sriram_malhar
How does an airline know who is slower just by looking at them? Other than a
few exceptions, of course. There are substantially many more who just take
their time settling in.

------
mattmcknight
Study is useless, as the number one factor in boarding is overhead bin space.
This is the problem to solve, likely with paid slots that are right above your
seat.

------
pochamago
I've always thought we should board back to front. Do first class travelers
really want to be stuck in a non moving plane longer than others anyway?

~~~
freedomben
I've always thought this too, but according to the article, we are wrong.

> _Steffen fully expected that boarding from the back to the front would be
> the most efficient strategy and was surprised when his results showed that
> strategy was actually the least efficient._

------
alfonsodev
I imagine in the future people will seat in the airport at waiting seats
platform and that platform will be inserted in the airplane like a cartridge.

------
yarrel
Can we just get rid of boarding "zones" and arrest whichever MBA came up with
them after reading one article on game theory.

------
loeg
I'm waiting for the inevitable preseating with the seat substructure slotted
in and out of the plane as a single piece.

------
commonskangaroo
To help climate change we want inefficient boarding since there's less people
flying

------
nxpnsv
Ban overhead luggage and many issues go away...

------
oneepic
Can't wait to get to the airport and hear them call for boarding:

"At this time we'd like to welcome all our slower passengers to the boarding
process. Again, our slow, lazy passengers are welcome to board the aircraft."

<people board>

"Group 1..."

<etc>

~~~
behringer
Another way to do it. Open the doors on the other side of the room. Wait until
half the people are there. Quickly close the door and open another door to the
plane.

