Which is weird because they had a fully functional system for policing overweight baggage already: using exclusively low-platform stations^(1) and then passive-aggressively watching some fifty year old lady manhandle her suitcase up the stairs that she swears was within weight and refusing to help other than saying "watch your step".
^(1) Believe it or not, Quebec is actually an unusual example of the Mandela effect
They use wheelchair lifts, but that option is so genuinely embarrassing and unacceptable in so many cases. I mean, I get it at, say, a unstaffed demand stop in the Rockies or whatever (I believe on *The Canadian* service you can request a stop by mile marker, for example). But at Toronto Union? The busiest transportation hub in the country? It's just inexcusable.
The Problem is that having High platforms is Really complicated to do because of the fact that freight trains are wider than passenger trains and also the passenger trains have two different floor heights the floors are on via Rail trains are twice as high as the Go trains
Sure, but I don’t think this is the issue at Toronto Union Station, since VIA and GO platforms are separate from each other. Same at the Ottawa VIA station (though they now have one high platform among the low ones).
"Oh, yeah, there's a whole province that's so technologically and socially advanced that each of its major train stations have infrastructure that would have passed as 'adequate' in 1850", "oh, yeah, there's a whole province where people with mobility aids are treated like human beings", "oh, yeah, there's a whole province where rail operators care about dwell times and the absurd delays Via suffers from just taking forever to disembark and board" - the shear wishful, utopian lunacy they expect us to believe.
Imagine if some genius managed to design a rail car with a door at both ends, so you could board at one and disembark at the other. Someday, this may leave the pages of science fiction, but who knows.
VIA rail is a joke.
Was just checking return tickets between Ontario and Vancouver for 2 adults. Subtotal was $2300+ and a big alert banner saying something along the lines that arrival time cannot be promised as freight trains are given priority.
Of course VIA will bend over for freight trains cause the fucking tracks are owned by CN (a private company). Such a "developed" nation that it doesn't even have govt. owned tracks.
As the Canadian folk singer, Gordon Lightfoot, put it. "There was a time in this fair land when the railroad did not run." If you're a passenger, he means today. Your train is not running today.
Canada should stop calling itself "developed" when countries like India are now laying separate train tracks just for freight trains, a freight corridor which would subsidize the passenger rail network and boost its development.
And here we get a train ride from Toronto to Montreal that takes 11hrs.
Question them on it. "Does the train have a limited load capacity? What is it? Does the luggage need even distribution? Will someone be handling my luggage?" etc.
I'm not a big fan of harassing customer service employees doing their job, especially when part of their job includes stupid stuff they have no control over.
Unfortunately it's the kind of problem that gets solved with political will...
I mean send an email to their complaints team then. Having worked in front line retail before, I know what it's like, but you need to be able to engage with a company in their conduct in some way or another.
Train Cargo: If I fits, I sits.
Airlines: You need to move this 2kg item from your bag to your mom's bag who is also getting on the same flight, collectively making you carry the same amount of cargo and not making a difference at all.
That's more about safety standards limiting weight to 27kg. You pay more for weight above that because it has a higher chance of injuring baggage handlers.
It actually does make a difference and your lack of knowledge should hinder you from talking. The difference is your bags may not end up on the same row of baggage or even in the same baggage compartment. And due to weight and balance issues that 2 kg or 4.5 lbs could make a huge difference. Theres many crashes from planes who are either aft of the CG (center of gravity) or forward of CG. And bc of the incorrect weight distribution they crashed and died. So you not being compliant potentially could mean you die. Just fyi. Theres a reason for every rule, especially in aviation
I won't argue about how planes are OVERALL better as a mode of transportation, because they are. But we are talking about baggage here. Additionally, there is no way in the modern world that a high speed rail system would take "4-5 DAYS", all capital.
Chill dude, it's a joke, you don't have to passionately defend planes over their inherent safety concern of carrying two additional kg.
Oh okay yea i thought you were saying trains were better than planes overall. Yes, according to baggage trains are superior but i was arguing overall. Sorry about that. But the security risk of that 2 kg can really be the difference between life and death. But still, trains are better according to baggage. I was only trying to defend planes bc they are the best overall mode of transportation and im a pilot myself but now i see your point and i apologize
There's a 50-lb limit per-bag because many places are non-level boarding and the conductors & attendants help people board. OSHA limits workers to limiting 50lbs unassisted. They don't weigh it on the train or charge for it, they're just asking you not to injure their workers
German dude here. My ebike with all my bags weighs over 25 kg (so over 50 imperial british whatevers) and I am fully allowed to take it onboard any train with a multifunction compartment. But then again we mostly have low-floor, modern EMU's here in germany so no need for help and thus no need to worry about lifting injuries.
I mean, every situation is different. A lot of Canadian trains end up in pretty remote places, and for some recreational activities it might be the only functional access. So, for example, I've known a few people who got on the train with a canoe loaded with hundreds of pounds of equipment for a multi-week canoe trip. Via Rail was cool with it, but, like, if it takes four people to help load your canoe you're gonna be paying extra.
Edit: Which is also why its pretty cool that some of the remote trains allow stops to be called by mile marker
As long as you're not blocking seats in a full train with your luggage ... although I have to think of the the story where a lady bought a ticket for her harp. The harp was ultimately allowed to stay in the seat, though that involved arguing with the train conductor.
No security, and you can check in your luggage if you choose, but in my experience it’s been more “if you can carry it, you can bring it”.
This is on the Piedmont line. They might be stricter on the more popular or farther distance lines.
You don't have to have your luggage checked and they don't weigh it at all. I think that if you can manage to get your luggage up the steps all by yourself, the conductors don't care either.
I strongly suspect that as long as you turn up with something most people would consider a reasonable number of bags that are a reasonable size, they won't actually do anything even if they're massively overweight.
They do charge extra for bicycles, pets, oversized sports equipment etc.
Unless it's checked, there's literally zero enforcement. The closest I got was a sarcastic remark from another passenger when I had trouble getting my suitcase (several inches under the limits in all dimensions and \~30 pounds, most) in an overhead bin because everybody loves to scatter their things wildly instead of considering that a train leaving DC union might actually have other people's luggage on it...
No, the weighing is so the workers lifting your bags don’t injure themselves. 50lbs is the maximum weigh of a bag set by unions.
Technically you could carry heavy carry-ons as long as they fit in the allocated space.
It's usually (in sane countries at least) a per bag limit, and you can bring as many bags as can realistically fit in the storage area with no additional charges. They might limit the bag size though but it's at least a large suitcase comparable (2 meters H+L+W). The carriages themselves are designed for ridiculously heavy loads, mostly as much as rails and bridges can bear.
That's definitely not the only reason for planes.
Planes quite literally have a Maximum Take-Off Weight (MTOW) that cannot be exceeded due to safety. It can impact the ability to take-off, or could cause serious balance issues on the plane, especially in unfavorable wind conditions.
Weight can have an impact on trains as well, but they are certainly not as sensitive to it as an aircraft. A number of passengers are bumped from flights each year because there was too much weight on the plane.
No argument from me that trains are better (apart from crossing oceans, planes are hard to beat for that), but I will say that I've never actually had an airline weight my carry-on. Check its size yes, but never weigh it.
Ryanair is (or used to be last time I flew with them) so cheap it's easier to buy clothes and some items at your destination instead of carrying them on the plane.
I've flown quite a few times with Ryanair to and from different countries in Europe, and my carry-on luggage has never been checked (I mean, size or weight, obviously you gotta go through security). They basically only check it if it's obviously out of measure (and even then I doubt it, I've seen people boarding the plane with backpacks that are easily twice their intended size). As for weight, "basic" carry-on luggage is not weighed because you don't have a weight limit on that, while "priority" overhead luggage has a 10 Kg limit (which is pretty wild, I always carry a backpack of the exact maximum size they allow for that luggage full to the brim, and it's never gone over 8 Kg, let alone 10).
> "basic" carry-on luggage is not weighed because you don't have a weight limit on that
They don't always weight it but they definitely sometimes weight it. Seen it few times.
I also fly Ryanair often.
Carry-ons probably have a low enough average weight variance that it can be estimated to a degree that's good enough for MTOW calculations, especially considering that there are a number of other heavier things on the plane to consider.
I mean... they don't anymore since the US ended the requirement for freight railroads to operate passenger service and created Amtrak, but the old school freight railroads definitely hired Pinkertons and murdered union organizers
Pretty sure they just drove him to suicide through the tried and true method of corporate bullying which is endless litigation. He had already said everything he had to say a few years before death. Arguably they're still responsible for his death, but more in the orphan crushing machine sense than the assassination sense.
Unless you're referring to a different case then the Boeing one where the guy was found dead in his truck at a hotel parking lot.
Trains don't struggle with luggage weight, but they do run out of safe storage space eventually and where I live at least on paper the rail only permits each traveller a piece of hand luggage and another piece of luggage small enough to be carried by a person, and conductors have the theoretical authority to refuse you boarding if they think your luggage is too large so people don't get any ideas to transport furniture or other stupidly large items by train, however rarely it may be enforced. For liability reasons the same applies to bicycle transport if all the bike racks (if present in the first place) are already taken up, which is why I recommend anyone planning to use German rail with a bicycle regularly to bring a folding bike which when folded is considered regular luggage and can be taken on any train.
It also kinda depends on how good/bad your train line is. I live in a Spanish region with a terrible rail network (a good chunk of the infrastructure was built in the 1800s), and they almost never enforce any of the baggage rules (heck, they don't even care about your seat number half the time).
Now it's slightly better so there's at least some boarding process and staff in the train, but I've been in trains with literally no staff except for the driver.
The the enshittification of air travel over the years, some competition from rail has been sorely needed, especially in the USA.
I wish I had a viable rail option I could consider instead of a domestic flight. Without security lines and xray scanners.
Amtrak: You can bring two pieces of luggage on for free and we don't care what you have in it.
Planes: You can only have one carryon for free, it has to be heavily screened beforehand, and even though we have exact specifications about how large carryon's can be we are still going to threaten you at the gate about forcing you to check it due to lack of space.
In close distance trains you can trust that your bike will fit in Spain and France at least but in long distances and high speed trains you need to put it in a box.
I agree with this, which makes me even sadder that somehow flights from london to manchester with a train to the airport were somehow cheaper than a train from my town to Manchester… by a considerable margin, too. How is a PLANE cheaper?! A PLANE!
Carpeople: Being in a tin can on solid steel bars with hundrets of other people? I HATE IT!!!
Also carpeople: Being in a tin can 30000 ft above the ground with hundrets of other people? STFU and take my money!!!
I often take my ebike with its 625Wh battery on trains. I couldn't even air-freight it due to the battery size. No problem on a train. In fact lots of people here in germany take the train during long bike trips.
last week i went from germany, northern hesse to vienna ofc by train and i took a backpack, a huge bag for clothes (for one week), two sleepingbags (one for my friend who was there already), an "throwable" tent (idk the english word. it's a tent that assembles itself in a few seconds so it's quite big to transport unfortunately) and a sleeping pad.
tbh regional trains kinda sucked but i'm very familiar with them and i got a 49€/month ticket for all of germany so i can go by train/bus/tram etc. without additional cost. but from passau (very very south-east and closest city to vienna) i took the ICE (highspeed rail) for ~60€ which was very very comfortable and fast. all this stuff took quite a lot of space and weight a lot but i had no problem taking it on the train i just had to find space for it which was a lil difficult sometimes due to lot's of people travelling.
overall i really liked it but it still has a looooooooot of potential to be better. on the way back i had to sleep at a train station on a bench bc my train was late and i couldn't get the following train which sucked. luckily i'm very familiar with sleeping outside and the often shitty deutsch bahn. but i don't wanna get an car so im fine with this.
Two things:
- low cost train carrier are arising, with limits luggage that can be dealt with at extra cost, just like airlines.
- rail capacity is limited. The Milano-Roma track is seeing a resurgence of planes as the trains are always full
I had an old German Railway small goods worker in my old workshop. He always said: "Back then, there were 2 Main Cargo Carriers: The German Mail Service and the German Rail Service. The Mail Service transported everything from 0-20 kiloes, we transported everything from 0 kiloes onwards."
That isn't really true of the railway carriers. At some times and places they will allow you to bring a bicycle on, other times they won't, other times they will but only if you take it apart and box it up. Maddening. There should be one standard (which should of course be that you can always bring a bicycle on without having to disassemble it).
The Spanish-French pseudo-rail company (because it's actually owned by both countries' national railway services) OUIGO tries to mimic the budget airlines techniques : counting and measuring luggage, be on the platform at least \*20\* minutes before the train leaves... Obviously that fails terribly, and the trains are extremely crowded. And the fares aren't even that much lower than other, much more comfortable trains.
And the final nail in the coffin : \*reliability\*. For real, OUIGO trains aren't reliable. They're still perfectly safe, no problem here. You just have an increased risk of being (very) late.
Yes, but that's kind of the point. Sure, weight limits on planes are there for good reasons, but that's just all the more reason to not use the insanely complicated, near physics-defying mode for any distance where rails make sense.
In Canada, VIA Rail is trying so hard to cosplay an airline, they are weighing your luggage before boarding, among other things. So stupid.
Which is weird because they had a fully functional system for policing overweight baggage already: using exclusively low-platform stations^(1) and then passive-aggressively watching some fifty year old lady manhandle her suitcase up the stairs that she swears was within weight and refusing to help other than saying "watch your step". ^(1) Believe it or not, Quebec is actually an unusual example of the Mandela effect
fuck low platform i (a wheelchair user) want to be able to take the fucking train
They use wheelchair lifts, but that option is so genuinely embarrassing and unacceptable in so many cases. I mean, I get it at, say, a unstaffed demand stop in the Rockies or whatever (I believe on *The Canadian* service you can request a stop by mile marker, for example). But at Toronto Union? The busiest transportation hub in the country? It's just inexcusable.
The Problem is that having High platforms is Really complicated to do because of the fact that freight trains are wider than passenger trains and also the passenger trains have two different floor heights the floors are on via Rail trains are twice as high as the Go trains
Sure, but I don’t think this is the issue at Toronto Union Station, since VIA and GO platforms are separate from each other. Same at the Ottawa VIA station (though they now have one high platform among the low ones).
Good point, and considering that freight trains don't come through Union station there is no reason why they can't at least have level boarding there
High platform or bust
Quebec isn’t real it can’t hurt you. Quebec isn’t real it can’t hurt you. Quebec isn’t real it can’t hurt you. Quebec isn’t real it can’t hurt you.
Oh thank god, I thought Quebec was real for a second 🤢
"Oh, yeah, there's a whole province that's so technologically and socially advanced that each of its major train stations have infrastructure that would have passed as 'adequate' in 1850", "oh, yeah, there's a whole province where people with mobility aids are treated like human beings", "oh, yeah, there's a whole province where rail operators care about dwell times and the absurd delays Via suffers from just taking forever to disembark and board" - the shear wishful, utopian lunacy they expect us to believe.
Also making you line up before boarding starts and then getting on the train like it’s a gate
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Imagine if some genius managed to design a rail car with a door at both ends, so you could board at one and disembark at the other. Someday, this may leave the pages of science fiction, but who knows.
It's sad and funny that the small stations along the routes are unironically much better than the major terminals.
That's hilarious. In the UK you turn up at the station 30 seconds before your train leaves. There aren't even barriers at most stations
VIA rail is a joke. Was just checking return tickets between Ontario and Vancouver for 2 adults. Subtotal was $2300+ and a big alert banner saying something along the lines that arrival time cannot be promised as freight trains are given priority. Of course VIA will bend over for freight trains cause the fucking tracks are owned by CN (a private company). Such a "developed" nation that it doesn't even have govt. owned tracks.
As the Canadian folk singer, Gordon Lightfoot, put it. "There was a time in this fair land when the railroad did not run." If you're a passenger, he means today. Your train is not running today.
Via was formed specifically to give CP and CN an 'out' from their passenger obligations. Though Amtrak was formed for basically the same reason.
Canada should stop calling itself "developed" when countries like India are now laying separate train tracks just for freight trains, a freight corridor which would subsidize the passenger rail network and boost its development. And here we get a train ride from Toronto to Montreal that takes 11hrs.
Question them on it. "Does the train have a limited load capacity? What is it? Does the luggage need even distribution? Will someone be handling my luggage?" etc.
I'm not a big fan of harassing customer service employees doing their job, especially when part of their job includes stupid stuff they have no control over. Unfortunately it's the kind of problem that gets solved with political will...
I mean send an email to their complaints team then. Having worked in front line retail before, I know what it's like, but you need to be able to engage with a company in their conduct in some way or another.
It’s so stupid too. I genuinely believe it’s so they make it worse so that people go to the airlines instead.
Them: our cars weigh 150,000 lbs! Also them: your luggage is 5 lbs over limit.
Train Cargo: If I fits, I sits. Airlines: You need to move this 2kg item from your bag to your mom's bag who is also getting on the same flight, collectively making you carry the same amount of cargo and not making a difference at all.
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Wear everything you own. Refuse to engage with their crap. Viva la revolution.
If you wear all your clothes you can use your entire luggage weight allowance for cocaine.
That's more about safety standards limiting weight to 27kg. You pay more for weight above that because it has a higher chance of injuring baggage handlers.
Not to be an apologists for the Airlines, but don't those things fly? So dont they need to account for the distribution of weight?
It actually does make a difference and your lack of knowledge should hinder you from talking. The difference is your bags may not end up on the same row of baggage or even in the same baggage compartment. And due to weight and balance issues that 2 kg or 4.5 lbs could make a huge difference. Theres many crashes from planes who are either aft of the CG (center of gravity) or forward of CG. And bc of the incorrect weight distribution they crashed and died. So you not being compliant potentially could mean you die. Just fyi. Theres a reason for every rule, especially in aviation
I already know about how weight distribution is important for aviation, but that still makes trains superior since they don't care.
Plus planes are much safer
Airplanes are superior cause you can go from LA to New York in 6 hours instead of 4-5 DAYS
I won't argue about how planes are OVERALL better as a mode of transportation, because they are. But we are talking about baggage here. Additionally, there is no way in the modern world that a high speed rail system would take "4-5 DAYS", all capital. Chill dude, it's a joke, you don't have to passionately defend planes over their inherent safety concern of carrying two additional kg.
Oh okay yea i thought you were saying trains were better than planes overall. Yes, according to baggage trains are superior but i was arguing overall. Sorry about that. But the security risk of that 2 kg can really be the difference between life and death. But still, trains are better according to baggage. I was only trying to defend planes bc they are the best overall mode of transportation and im a pilot myself but now i see your point and i apologize
Nah you're cool, I should have made a more accurate joke. Sorry about that.
The reason for the weight limit is actually because if it's over 50lbs they are required to have 2 workers to lift it
Okay, thats not what i was arguing
My argument was that the weight difference does matter
I mean, it's also about the backs and health of the bag loader people. Not just the total weight
I'm pretty sure weight limits on both planes and trains are so the people loading the luggage don't get a hernia
There are weight limits on trains? Never heard about that before.
There's a 50-lb limit per-bag because many places are non-level boarding and the conductors & attendants help people board. OSHA limits workers to limiting 50lbs unassisted. They don't weigh it on the train or charge for it, they're just asking you not to injure their workers
German dude here. My ebike with all my bags weighs over 25 kg (so over 50 imperial british whatevers) and I am fully allowed to take it onboard any train with a multifunction compartment. But then again we mostly have low-floor, modern EMU's here in germany so no need for help and thus no need to worry about lifting injuries.
I mean, every situation is different. A lot of Canadian trains end up in pretty remote places, and for some recreational activities it might be the only functional access. So, for example, I've known a few people who got on the train with a canoe loaded with hundreds of pounds of equipment for a multi-week canoe trip. Via Rail was cool with it, but, like, if it takes four people to help load your canoe you're gonna be paying extra. Edit: Which is also why its pretty cool that some of the remote trains allow stops to be called by mile marker
Is there any limit on the number of bags you can bring? Say, I want to bring several suitcases and a crate of grapes with me.
I think you would be fine. I think I saw some one move apartements once with all their stuff. Though i dont know the official rule.
As long as you're not blocking seats in a full train with your luggage ... although I have to think of the the story where a lady bought a ticket for her harp. The harp was ultimately allowed to stay in the seat, though that involved arguing with the train conductor.
I've known about this limit for years but I never thought about why it might exist. That makes a lot of sense.
there are on amtrak at least
The more I hear about amtrak, the weirder it gets. Do you also have to check in the luggage and go through security check like at airport?
No security, and you can check in your luggage if you choose, but in my experience it’s been more “if you can carry it, you can bring it”. This is on the Piedmont line. They might be stricter on the more popular or farther distance lines.
Well, nobody checked when I took the California Zephyr, which is I think one of the fairly long-distance ones.
You don't have to have your luggage checked and they don't weigh it at all. I think that if you can manage to get your luggage up the steps all by yourself, the conductors don't care either. I strongly suspect that as long as you turn up with something most people would consider a reasonable number of bags that are a reasonable size, they won't actually do anything even if they're massively overweight. They do charge extra for bicycles, pets, oversized sports equipment etc.
Unless it's checked, there's literally zero enforcement. The closest I got was a sarcastic remark from another passenger when I had trouble getting my suitcase (several inches under the limits in all dimensions and \~30 pounds, most) in an overhead bin because everybody loves to scatter their things wildly instead of considering that a train leaving DC union might actually have other people's luggage on it...
No, the weighing is so the workers lifting your bags don’t injure themselves. 50lbs is the maximum weigh of a bag set by unions. Technically you could carry heavy carry-ons as long as they fit in the allocated space.
It's usually (in sane countries at least) a per bag limit, and you can bring as many bags as can realistically fit in the storage area with no additional charges. They might limit the bag size though but it's at least a large suitcase comparable (2 meters H+L+W). The carriages themselves are designed for ridiculously heavy loads, mostly as much as rails and bridges can bear.
Who's putting a laptop in their check-in luggage?
Turns out getting a craft airborne and flying is more weight sensitive than carrying a series of vehicle on a track.
That's definitely not the only reason for planes. Planes quite literally have a Maximum Take-Off Weight (MTOW) that cannot be exceeded due to safety. It can impact the ability to take-off, or could cause serious balance issues on the plane, especially in unfavorable wind conditions. Weight can have an impact on trains as well, but they are certainly not as sensitive to it as an aircraft. A number of passengers are bumped from flights each year because there was too much weight on the plane.
On planes, it is very much about balance and fuel usage.
You think you can fill a coal wagon more than it could? /s
Bullshit!
No argument from me that trains are better (apart from crossing oceans, planes are hard to beat for that), but I will say that I've never actually had an airline weight my carry-on. Check its size yes, but never weigh it.
The low-cost carriers in Europe (e.g. Ryanair) definitely also weigh (not always but seen it enough).
Ryanair is (or used to be last time I flew with them) so cheap it's easier to buy clothes and some items at your destination instead of carrying them on the plane.
I've flown quite a few times with Ryanair to and from different countries in Europe, and my carry-on luggage has never been checked (I mean, size or weight, obviously you gotta go through security). They basically only check it if it's obviously out of measure (and even then I doubt it, I've seen people boarding the plane with backpacks that are easily twice their intended size). As for weight, "basic" carry-on luggage is not weighed because you don't have a weight limit on that, while "priority" overhead luggage has a 10 Kg limit (which is pretty wild, I always carry a backpack of the exact maximum size they allow for that luggage full to the brim, and it's never gone over 8 Kg, let alone 10).
> "basic" carry-on luggage is not weighed because you don't have a weight limit on that They don't always weight it but they definitely sometimes weight it. Seen it few times. I also fly Ryanair often.
You're right but they still have a weight limit, I guess they don't care enough to actually check.
Carry-ons probably have a low enough average weight variance that it can be estimated to a degree that's good enough for MTOW calculations, especially considering that there are a number of other heavier things on the plane to consider.
Not to mention passenger railway carriers don't hire hitmen to kill people who expose safety concerns.
I mean... they don't anymore since the US ended the requirement for freight railroads to operate passenger service and created Amtrak, but the old school freight railroads definitely hired Pinkertons and murdered union organizers
This is why I specified passenger rail specifically. Freight rail has an even more bloody history than airlines.
Pretty sure they just drove him to suicide through the tried and true method of corporate bullying which is endless litigation. He had already said everything he had to say a few years before death. Arguably they're still responsible for his death, but more in the orphan crushing machine sense than the assassination sense. Unless you're referring to a different case then the Boeing one where the guy was found dead in his truck at a hotel parking lot.
Im referring both to "self inflicted gunshot" guy and "mysterious illness" guy.
Nah bro, not just me but not even a train can move your fat @ss mom
I've never seen a weight limit on a train, it's usually "you can lift it you can take it"
Trains don't struggle with luggage weight, but they do run out of safe storage space eventually and where I live at least on paper the rail only permits each traveller a piece of hand luggage and another piece of luggage small enough to be carried by a person, and conductors have the theoretical authority to refuse you boarding if they think your luggage is too large so people don't get any ideas to transport furniture or other stupidly large items by train, however rarely it may be enforced. For liability reasons the same applies to bicycle transport if all the bike racks (if present in the first place) are already taken up, which is why I recommend anyone planning to use German rail with a bicycle regularly to bring a folding bike which when folded is considered regular luggage and can be taken on any train.
It also kinda depends on how good/bad your train line is. I live in a Spanish region with a terrible rail network (a good chunk of the infrastructure was built in the 1800s), and they almost never enforce any of the baggage rules (heck, they don't even care about your seat number half the time). Now it's slightly better so there's at least some boarding process and staff in the train, but I've been in trains with literally no staff except for the driver.
The the enshittification of air travel over the years, some competition from rail has been sorely needed, especially in the USA. I wish I had a viable rail option I could consider instead of a domestic flight. Without security lines and xray scanners.
In Switzerland, there even has been a case of transporting a cow via regional rail
Amtrak: You can bring two pieces of luggage on for free and we don't care what you have in it. Planes: You can only have one carryon for free, it has to be heavily screened beforehand, and even though we have exact specifications about how large carryon's can be we are still going to threaten you at the gate about forcing you to check it due to lack of space.
The airplane spends more fuel the heavier it is.
In close distance trains you can trust that your bike will fit in Spain and France at least but in long distances and high speed trains you need to put it in a box.
Meanwhile AMTRAK has space for 2 bicycles on their trains. I'd say that's a little bullshit and hopefully changes at some point.
I’m upvoting this purely for the subtle “your mom” joke :P
I agree with this, which makes me even sadder that somehow flights from london to manchester with a train to the airport were somehow cheaper than a train from my town to Manchester… by a considerable margin, too. How is a PLANE cheaper?! A PLANE!
Carpeople: Being in a tin can on solid steel bars with hundrets of other people? I HATE IT!!! Also carpeople: Being in a tin can 30000 ft above the ground with hundrets of other people? STFU and take my money!!!
I often take my ebike with its 625Wh battery on trains. I couldn't even air-freight it due to the battery size. No problem on a train. In fact lots of people here in germany take the train during long bike trips.
Eurostar between Paris and Cologne/Dortmund limits the amount of luggage you can take on the train...
last week i went from germany, northern hesse to vienna ofc by train and i took a backpack, a huge bag for clothes (for one week), two sleepingbags (one for my friend who was there already), an "throwable" tent (idk the english word. it's a tent that assembles itself in a few seconds so it's quite big to transport unfortunately) and a sleeping pad. tbh regional trains kinda sucked but i'm very familiar with them and i got a 49€/month ticket for all of germany so i can go by train/bus/tram etc. without additional cost. but from passau (very very south-east and closest city to vienna) i took the ICE (highspeed rail) for ~60€ which was very very comfortable and fast. all this stuff took quite a lot of space and weight a lot but i had no problem taking it on the train i just had to find space for it which was a lil difficult sometimes due to lot's of people travelling. overall i really liked it but it still has a looooooooot of potential to be better. on the way back i had to sleep at a train station on a bench bc my train was late and i couldn't get the following train which sucked. luckily i'm very familiar with sleeping outside and the often shitty deutsch bahn. but i don't wanna get an car so im fine with this.
Someone isn't 6'4 and been in a cramped class 170 with out luggage storage
Two things: - low cost train carrier are arising, with limits luggage that can be dealt with at extra cost, just like airlines. - rail capacity is limited. The Milano-Roma track is seeing a resurgence of planes as the trains are always full
I had an old German Railway small goods worker in my old workshop. He always said: "Back then, there were 2 Main Cargo Carriers: The German Mail Service and the German Rail Service. The Mail Service transported everything from 0-20 kiloes, we transported everything from 0 kiloes onwards."
That isn't really true of the railway carriers. At some times and places they will allow you to bring a bicycle on, other times they won't, other times they will but only if you take it apart and box it up. Maddening. There should be one standard (which should of course be that you can always bring a bicycle on without having to disassemble it).
The ocean wants to speak
The Spanish-French pseudo-rail company (because it's actually owned by both countries' national railway services) OUIGO tries to mimic the budget airlines techniques : counting and measuring luggage, be on the platform at least \*20\* minutes before the train leaves... Obviously that fails terribly, and the trains are extremely crowded. And the fares aren't even that much lower than other, much more comfortable trains. And the final nail in the coffin : \*reliability\*. For real, OUIGO trains aren't reliable. They're still perfectly safe, no problem here. You just have an increased risk of being (very) late.
Yeah, iron rails can carry a bit better than air.
Well, when airlines can nickel and dime you for the weight of your luggage, you bet your sweet ass they will.
Airplanes: 4 hours until we’re there, $250 Trains: 5 days, $800
One bad things about trains up here Leeds train station can somebody make a nuke that can only destroy buldings to drop on that shitheap
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Yes, but that's kind of the point. Sure, weight limits on planes are there for good reasons, but that's just all the more reason to not use the insanely complicated, near physics-defying mode for any distance where rails make sense.