Would You Fly Standing Up If The Airfare Cost You $7?

If you’re travelling economy, you’d be familiar with its many downfalls. 

Small chairs. Minimal legroom. Screaming children in surround sound.

In the grand scheme of things though, all these irritants are a small price to pay for the luxury of global travel on a tight budget.

But would you consider standing up on a flight to save yourself some moola?

One airline reckons you might, and so they’ve invested a fair bit of time and money into researching how to make it happen.

Budget airline VivaColumbia say they’re “very interested” in the idea on bar stool-like seats, which would dramatically drive down the cost of airfares, making them more accessible to everyone. It would look like this:

It sounds like a half alright idea at first, but when you think about it properly, it’s shithouse. A bit like the Monorail.

Imagine being perched up on that weird-ass half-chair for an entire flight. Horrible. Heck, I can’t even imagine sitting on that chair full stop.

It’s not the first time carriers have toyed with the idea of stand up seats. 

In 2003, Airbus came up with the concept of a vertical seat that would allow passengers to stand while still being strapped in.

In 2010, Ryanair (a cheap Irish airline) announced plans to offer $7 flights to passengers will to stand.

In the same year, Italian seat design company AvioInteriors made seats you could perch on so more stuff could get packed onto the plane.

Ultimately, all these ideas were shot to the ground, and sadly for those of you getting excited by a cheap standing ticket, it looks like VivaColombia’s big plans are gonna get scratched, too.