Originally Posted by
Redhead
Learn to do it with the child standing up that way you can do it on the loo. They can stand on the toilet seat and you can change them that way. Never ever ever change them at your seat or in the aisle. And yes take way more diapers and a change of plans for both of you.
That assumes the child can stand. Most U1s can't stand, and the U1s that can stand probably shouldn't be standing on the toilet seat unless the caretaker of the child can do the whole process -- whatever that may be -- one handed. And most can't do all of that for a standing 8-12 month old without potentially risking a slip up of sorts, no less so if unexpected turbulence hits while wholly or partially in the tiny lavatory.
There are lots of parents/caretakers who can barely fit into the tiniest of the new plane lavatories even when alone in the lavatory. The idea of all such parents/caretakers being able to stand in the bathroom with a standing child and being able to maneuver easily to deal with a runny, messy diaper is a pipe dream.
Airlines should prepare for a lot more diaper changes being done on the plane floors in the galleys and the aisles, and even on the plane seats. Maybe even on the tray tables -- as horrible an idea as that is, even more horrible than the rest of the possibilities mentioned in the prior sentence.
And given the growing proportion of men -- who are generally larger than women -- as the primary caretaker of children or takers of parental leave (unpaid or otherwise) when transporting children by air, this issue will only become more likely a visibly public one.
I seem to find a lower proportion of plane bathrooms with changing tables for infants nowadays in the US and TATL/EU markets than used to be the case say 5 years ago. I also seem to find the plane bathrooms are smaller on average than they used to be say 5-10 years ago. And I also find that passengers seem to be bigger now than they were say 15-30 years ago.
When space to move properly in a bathroom becomes less likely, the bathrooms will get more disgusting than they used to be. When the space to properly change the diaper of a infant/toddler in a a bathroom is harder to come across, the planes will get more disgusting than they already are. Thank the greedy airlines -- and the airlines' willingness to exchange passenger comfort for ever more profits -- for the gross-out factor spreading on the planes.