The U.S. Department of Transportation has taken two moves on passenger rights for families and for people with disabilities that are as newsworthy for how little they change as for their existence.
The first item is a notice to airlines urging, but not requiring, that they adopt policies to make it easy and without cost for families to be seated together, and saying that starting in November DOT will monitor airline seating policies. DOT has had the power since 2016 to regulate family seating “if appropriate,” but decided then it didn’t need to use its power.
The second item is described as a Bill of Rights for passengers with disabilities, but is actually only a summary on one page of a variety of rights that already exist under various laws. They include rights to assistance to and onto aircraft, use of assistive devices and service animals and at least one accessible lavatory on most planes.
Also not yet written in rules: minimum seat pitch and seat width. FAA was ordered by law to determine minimums, with a requirement for rules to be in place by 2020. FAA has refused to comply, despite several court victories by Flyers Rights demanding compliance. A new suit was filed last January, but in the meantime, some of the ultra-low-cost airlines have shrunk seat pitch to as little as 28″
