I was thinking again about this business of which way a baby should face in its buggy, which has attracted quite a lot of attention
Many adults are fussy about which way they face when travelling by train. In particular, some say they cannot bear to sit facing backwards, they need to see where they are going
I was never bothered by this until I realised that it made a big difference to my back – could even affect whether I could rise from my seat without assistance when we reached our destination
Trains never accelerate very much, but they do brake quite hard, so it is better to be thrown against the back of the seat than to be thrown forwards
The train companies have always recognised that people have preferences of course, & allow you to specify when booking a seat
In the old British Rail Inter City days the booking system was not all that reliable (it could not even guarantee that seats would not be double booked), so you could easily find that the seat with your number on it did not face the way you wanted
This happened to me at Manchester one day, but the train was not full, so I moved to one which did. When the conductor came round I explained to him – thinking to be helpful – that I would not be using the booked seat, because I needed my back to the engine
He told me that, since those trains had two engines – one at either end – I should have asked for Back to Direction of Travel
Neither his face nor his voice suggested he was joking, but I smiled anyway
Many adults are fussy about which way they face when travelling by train. In particular, some say they cannot bear to sit facing backwards, they need to see where they are going
I was never bothered by this until I realised that it made a big difference to my back – could even affect whether I could rise from my seat without assistance when we reached our destination
Trains never accelerate very much, but they do brake quite hard, so it is better to be thrown against the back of the seat than to be thrown forwards
The train companies have always recognised that people have preferences of course, & allow you to specify when booking a seat
In the old British Rail Inter City days the booking system was not all that reliable (it could not even guarantee that seats would not be double booked), so you could easily find that the seat with your number on it did not face the way you wanted
This happened to me at Manchester one day, but the train was not full, so I moved to one which did. When the conductor came round I explained to him – thinking to be helpful – that I would not be using the booked seat, because I needed my back to the engine
He told me that, since those trains had two engines – one at either end – I should have asked for Back to Direction of Travel
Neither his face nor his voice suggested he was joking, but I smiled anyway
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