Lame Service Is To Blame Unfriendly Skies Overbooking, Too-Tight Schedules Trigger Carry-On Crush.

What prompted airline passengers this year to haul aboard more carry-on luggage than available storage spaces possibly could accommodate?

Some airlines appear to think it’s the passengers’ fault. So, they’re cutting back the amount of luggage passengers are permitted to carry. And, unlike the old limits, the new ones might be enforced.

The airlines are mistaken. They’re attempting to cure a symptom because they’re too cheap to cure the disease. Instead of shouldering responsibility they are blaming the customers, who merely have been responding to the real problem - mediocre service.

There are cattle trucks more commodious than some of the cram-jammed, overbooked airliners that sit parked in line for takeoff at the nation’s overcrowded airports.

When it comes to moving parcels from place to place, airlines could learn even from U.S. Postal Service, which is modernizing to make delivery faster and more reliable. Then there’s FedEx and UPS, which track shipments by computer and guarantee timely delivery.

But airline passengers, obviously, have concluded that they cannot trust airlines to deliver checked-through luggage on time, in one piece or even to the right destination. That’s why they’re stretching the carry-on limits. That’s why some folks even FedEx their luggage.

Reasons for this are as obvious as the overbooked flights, the delays and connecting flights scheduled so close together that luggage can’t keep up with passengers. Airlines and the federal government simply have not improved services or airports enough to keep pace with customer demand.

The solution won’t come from mere regulation tinkering, although there might be partial relief in consistent enforcement of existing carry-on rules. The solution will come when one airline, and then another, sees a competitive opportunity in the current headaches. Fly with us, these airlines will say, and we’ll guarantee your check-through luggage arrives on time and in good shape, and we’ll pay you if it doesn’t. We’ll track it by computer, as UPS does. We’ll save you the hassle of sprinting through huge airports with heavy carry-ons flopping against your legs. We’ll stop overbooking flights and scheduling them too tightly. We’ll provide better service than our competitors do.

OK, airlines. Who’ll go first? , DataTimes MEMO: For opposing view, see “Me-first pushiness behind stuffed bins”

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