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Travel

Tight airline seats raise fuel efficiency

If you are crammed into a shrinking airline seat in a cabin in which passengers are packed sardine style, it might be comforting to know that, at the very least, you are helping the environment.

The nation’s airlines have gradually improved fuel efficiency rates on a passenger-per-mile basis, according to an annual study that gives credit to the trend of squeezing in more passengers per plane.

The bad news: Passenger comfort has been sacrificed for fuel efficiency, according to a study by the International Council on Clean Transportation, a nonprofit group that researches and promotes clean transportation efforts.

The average domestic flight in the U.S. carried 145 seats in 2010, but by 2014 that number rose to 150 seats, according to the nonprofit group.

The squeeze is expected to continue. The average wide-body plane will grow by about 20 seats over the next 20 years, while the average single-aisle plane will grow by about 10 seats, according to aircraft manufacturer Boeing Co.

Expedia adds bag fee feature on sites

One of the nation’s largest online travel search companies has added a feature to make it easier for you to see the true cost of flying. But you still need to do some extra work to get the whole picture.

Expedia Inc., which operates such sites as Expedia.com, Orbitz.com and Travelocity.com, has added a feature to all of its websites that displays in each travel search the fees airlines charge to check bags. Critics have complained that information about bag fees is hard to find on most airline websites.

In the first six months of the year, the nation’s 14 largest airlines collected $1.8 billion in fees from checked bags, according to the U.S. Department of Transportation.

But Expedia still isn’t displaying all the other fees charged by airlines, such as charges for food, entertainment and access to Wi-Fi. A spokeswoman for Expedia said the company hopes to do so in the future.

All of those other fees add up to big numbers. In 2014 the world’s airlines raked in an estimated $38.1 billion in passenger fees and other revenue outside of airfares, a 21 percent increase from the previous year, according to IdeaWorks, an airline consulting firm.

Hugo Martin, Los Angeles Times

 

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