On a 3-hour flight home this weekend, I took a book with me that I finished well before the flight had landed. That time was one of the more excruciatingly boring moments I’ve had in a long time, and it gave me a lot of time to think about how it could be improved. As I sat there in my 28-A window seat on Northwest Airlines, not only was I noticing things that could be there, but things that were present but potentially unnecessary and annoying. It is simultaneously a case of too much and too little information. Not only do I think some of these ideas require fairly little effort on the part of the airline, but could also provide some things the airlines are truly looking for: customer satisfaction, repeat business, and cold card cash.

Too much information

© masochismtango

There is an information overload of signs, and “no smoking” messages in particular. Every row has illuminated no smoking signs, and there were even extra illuminated no smoking signs on the ceiling every few rows. I am almost 30 years old, and I have never been on a flight that allowed smoking. I think it may be ok to start relaxing on the message a bit. The pre-flight warning given by the attendants and a few signs here or there should do fine. Aside from this, there are still entirely too many randomly pasted (and highly obtuse) labels and instructional diagrams all over.

© Dave Malkoff

The safety instructions cards are very complex and terribly hard to understand. 2D illustrations trying to use steps and arrows cannot compete with seeing someone do it in real life. While I am too young to have experienced smoking flights, I am old enough to remember when the safety instructions were given by video demonstration, and would consider that a much better experience.

© PictureChaser

Giving the safety instructions by video would also address the issue of flight attendant safety demonstrations. I have not seen a more lifeless presentation than that done by flight attendants explaining a few safety instructions. They point out the instruction card (!), then proceed to point to vague areas of the plane, barely half-assed put on an oxygen mask, and unbuckle, buckle, and tighten a seat belt (which you’ve already had to have on for 5 minutes), and start heading to their seat before the pre-recorded voice-over finishes the first sentence. Giving the instructions by video would also give the attendants more time to do other tasks that are necessary to get the flight off the ground faster.

Before takeoff, the pilot usually comes on the intercom and tells you fairly little, and fairly useless (and often times unintelligible) information. Basically all I ever want to hear from the captain of the plane is some form of assurance. It would please me to the utmost to hear three things:

1. Their name (Put your name on the line and instill some confidence in your passengers!)
2. some assuring experience (like how long they’ve been flying? military experience? certification? Tell me why you’re flying the plane and I’m not!)
3. any possible issues or delays that they know of from air traffic control

The captain usually often talks over the intercom during the flight to give status updates.

• When the plane comes in to some turbulence, do I really need to be made aware of this? And do I then need to be made aware again that we descended to 31,000 feet to get out of it? These anecdotes and random numbers are completely pointless. Because the information is fairly trivial and broadcast to everyone, these messages are seen as annoying interruptions to your sleep or conversation or concentration.
• The captain also relays information to the flight attendants. Because it is broadcast to everyone, it is yet another useless interruption. Usually the information is duplicated, because they mention that that the plane is descending/parking/etc but then also give coded instructions (cross-check, all-call, etc) to the crew. If it is broadcast that we are descending, don’t the attendants know what they’re supposed to do, as part of their training? Just say one message that can be useful to everybody.

Too little information
There are certain people who want more information all the time, and certain moments where more information is desired. I think the key is to offer this information in a very non-intrusive way, such as not broadcasting the information in a scatter shot. I would propose this information gets disseminated in a few simple ways: triggers and lights, TV monitors, and information dashboards.

Triggers and lights would be used to subtly convey a message to the people who need it. Some nightclubs are a good example of this: if there is a problem (such as an unruly customer), there is not a message broadcast over the intercom system, but instead a switched flipped by an employee which turns on a light, which (by the color and location) tells all the employees where and what kind of problem it is. The proper people then respond.

• I was thinking a silent alarm trigger would be a helpful thing for passengers as well. While there is a “call attendant” button, it is available for all to see when it has been triggered. For example, if the person next to me was brandishing a knife or beginning to have some sort of medical problem, it would be nice to notify the attendants in a very discreet way that would not attract attention, like the alarm button a bank teller has.

© heymynameispaul

Television monitors: most (if not all) airplanes have them (many are even interactive, which would allow even more interesting ideas,) yet unless you are on a long enough flight to warrant a movie, they are usually not on. Why not put those to use?

• Put on travel programming: watching travel shows about interesting places would get me to fly more!
• Replace the advertising: there are hundreds of people on each plane all going to the same place. Talk about a targeted audience! How about sell the advertising to businesses in the place you are flying to? There are probably a bunch of people on the plane who live in the destination city, and another bunch who are just visiting and looking for something to do or a place to eat.

  (I had an interesting visual of how to accomplish this, which was basically syncing the plane at the airport like an iPod dock. You plug it in and it replaces the advertising playlist with advertisers from its next destination.)

Information dashboards would be used to create interest around the experience of flying, giving passengers something to watch when bored or nervous, and removing some of the unnecessary information normally broadcast to everyone.

• Give people a little ambient flight information that is currently broadcast over the intercom, such as seatbelt status, altitude, flight time remaining, flight path, etc.
• Provide the normal instructions and alerts that are broadcast, such as fastening seatbelts, status alerts (steady altitude, descending), etc
• Provide menus of meals, snacks, and drinks available
• Use the knowledge of the plane’s location to point at items of interest
  • Civic: Haven’t you ever wondered what cities are towns those blobs of lights are? Also perhaps as you get lower in altitude, more detailed information becomes available, such as neighborhoods, buildings, monuments, etc.
  • Geographic: mountains, lakes, rivers, etc
  • Agricultural: farms (I’ve always wondered about the different shapes and colors of farms)

  What you see when you look out your window
  
  © SeamusZ

  What you see when you look at your info map
  
  © Google Maps

• Provide an aviation enthusiast’s view of the flight, much like an air traffic controller. Show altitude, speed, bank, direction, wind, locations of other planes, things that the plane is doing (flaps up, landing gear down), etc
  
  © Drewski2112

I’d love to hear any thoughts or ideas you have.