One Down... Still trying to decompress
 

Greetings All,

For those whom have not seen my prior thread. I have been a long time American Airlines flyer (and at times Airtran when they were a great deal) but since I moved near to a regional airport run by Delta, I thought I would give them a chance so I could avoid the greatness that is Orlando.

The routing on this flight was MLB -- ATL -- OAJ. On the up side, I did recieve 1500 MQM for this flight due to the faircode, so heading towards status (will make similar trips almost every week to various places). All in all the staff, service, friendliness were all wonderful on Delta.

On both flights I was in the exit row (back one if it had one) so I had some extra leg room, and I was in a window seat (I do enjoy looking from time to time) but as someone whom is not a twig, but in no way large, I found myself pinned to the side of the plane the whole trip on both flights, buy an equally non-large individual. I had to basically sit leaning forward the whole flight or with my arms crossed and locked around my chest.

So, my question to you fellow Delta fliers is this, did I eat one too many Twinkies before my flight, or did all the rain shrink the planes. I just do not remember being squished like that, and it was all in the shoulder area, not the lower sections, though neither of us could use the arm rest as we would pry each other apart. I think I will try aisle seats on the return flight to see if that helps. All in all, I am just trying to determine if this is a design difference with Delta or just me getting fat, or perhaps I am just getting picky.

Thanks for any insight.

Mia

Hi Mia,

First off, as a Melbourne resident, WELCOME.

To your point, the CR2's we see at MLB these days are tiny. I haven't ever had the issue that you mention but could understand it.

Welcome to the land of CRJs (which I know is what is used on ATL-OAJ, and are quite frequent on MLB-ATL).

I'm a pretty small guy (5'6", 140 lbs) and also enjoy looking out the window, but on CRJs I've learned to go for an aisle seat to avoid that pinned feeling - I tend to go for 1B or 1C on the CRJs now - most legroom on the plane and shoulder room from the aisle.

Thanks for the comments, will try the suggested seats, also nice to see another Melbourne local in here. I will say as regional airports go, Melbourne is a really nice one. Great food too...

So, just to clarify, whom did they use as a size template on the CRJs?

Mia

There are actually a few locals here... Traveller as well as DaChief among others.

For the template, it was a 5'1 100lb woman.

You know, I don't think I saw a single one of those on the whole flight... I was actually quite surprised to see how full that 7am flight was this morning. I think there was 1 seat open.

:)

Mia

Being from an almost all CR2 station (save 1x CR7 to SLC), I feel your pain and it sounds like I'm in about the same category as you size-wise. I typically go for 8B/C or 1B/C.

One note which has helped me immensely: if I am paired with a person of similar or larger size, the aisle armrests do actually go up. There is a little button underneath that will do the trick. It's a little sticky on some planes, but just mess with it a bit and it will come up. This typically allows me to spread out and regain the use of the other armrest. You will have to put it down for take-off/landing.

Welcome to FT!

Well the 7am... is an MD88 (with first class). Are you talking about the 50 seat jet on the other flights we see daily?

I can remember 2 years ago where the were MULTIPLE 737's and M88's all year long. Those were the good days.... And they were often flying full (VERY HARD UPGRADE as a Platinum).

Tiny Tim?

Part of the problem in the CRJ-200 is location of the windows -- they make you feel the plane is even smaller than it is. The floor was lowered a bit in the -700 & -900 models so the windows seem positioned normally.

Unless I need to sleep I prefer the aisle seats, but then I have to guard my elbow from the carts.

DL used the same guy AA used for its CRJ700s years later. Fuselage width is identical across all Bombardier CRJs, be they 100s, 200s, 700s, or 900s. Pretty much all U.S. carriers set pitch in coach on CRJs at 31", too.