To think you can't ban food on trains?

[poshme]

In today's times (sorry rubbish at links) there's an article saying the outgoing chief medical officer wants to ban food on trains unless for medical reasons.
AIBU to think this is completely stupid & unworkable?
Apparently it's because we're snacking too much & too many children are obese.

I regularly catch trains with my kids- usually a 3-4 hr journey. Invariably it's a meal time, and part of passing the time is eating a packed meal. Yes- it's not the healthiest meal in the world & includes crisps & chocolate, but as part of a normal diet it's fine.

My kids are not overweight. In fact they're generally underweight.

If this is implemented they're never be able to enforce it surely?

Yeah thhis wouldnt work. Notmally my commute is very smallb(30 mins by bus ( so i eat at work.

This week ive been trwining in a city 1 5hrs away by train, miniimhm. Im up at 6.15 to leave th3 house and catch 7.30 bus. I only just make it in yown to cstcb the 8.10 ttwin and im rshknh then. I rush between connrctions etc before arrovinv at ttakning at 9.30. Traininh finishes early in theoty but the xommute is a killer. I lrave trainjng around 4pm, due to inckdents and fktrs on trains snd police incidents, trains sre running later and later. Im lucky to gwt a trajn thst leaves around 4.15. With slow trwins and delays etc id be luxky to get at my homr station before 6pm. Tben ive got to wait for abus, and finally get gome around 6.45.

So i eat breakfast on the trajn, usually a croissanf and hot xrink. I eat lunch during training and tea at home. I usually eat a snack pn the journey hlmr htough. I fwil to see why i should feel sick throug hunger, becayse somekne holds skme outdaged views

Branster

I would also prefer to see bans on food inside cinemas
(Faints) ...

Pinksparkly I meant club orange the drink ( sorry!!!) Yay to the twix, though!!!

PinkSparklyPussyCat, the adults should drink (and eat) what they want, absolutely.
It’s easier to control children’s habits with a blanket ban. Just that.
Your DH might be right, it wouldn’t surprise me. They might even ask for ID. My DH likes only standard Coke as an alternative to water, tea, coffee so we just keep a large bottle in the fridge which needs replacing every 6 weeks or so. But sometimes it’s not available to buy. I wonder if they try to phase it out or people are fed up with being offered alternatives with sweetness. DH also lets the side down by eating crisps
The whole ‘let’s control people’s habits by banning this or the other’ is not practical and is actually insulting.

Try only having an hour long lunch break at uni where your days start at 8am and last until 11pm with an other hour. dinner break but having to use said breaks to travel 30-45 mins on a local bus. If that ban was in force we’d only have had chocolate bars and crisps to eat

They should be looking at innovative ways to get people more active and interested in their own health and fitness rather than these pie in the sky ideas.

If she stops me and my reusable cup of coffee on the 7am train - she'll be dealing with a decaffeinated me and that's not something you want to deal with.

Hot food should be banned as the smell can be appalling and there's nothing worse than sitting on public transport when you have morning sickness or are unwell and get a strong waft of something hot or offensive.

You can't put a blanket ban as there are too many health exclusions to make this viable.

Besides, can you imagine being on a train to Scotland from the south and not being able to have a sandwich at least?

I’m fat. But don’t eat on public transport. Banning it really wouldn’t make a difference to obesity.

Banning special deals on chocolate and crisps would. Allowing shops to only have a very small percentage of sweets and crisps would. Selling chocolate and sweets behind a counter with no advertising (like cigarettes) would make a difference

Minimum pricing of sweets and crisps and junk food would make a difference

Why are so many people making irrelevant comments about long train journeys? It was a ban on local transport only. Please read the news before you comment on it or it’s a waste of time.
BTW I think the ban is a silly idea because I don’t think the idea will reduce childhood obesity at all but I do think it is unhygienic, smelly and inconsiderate to snack on local busses and on the tube. I don’t want to smell your oranges, eggs, tuna etc and to wonder if you’ve washed your hands beforehand and whether you will be able to wash your hands afterward (or just plan to lick your fingers) and if you intend to brush your teeth,

i think its bloody bullshit idea. another idiotic idea to make ure they dont have to put money into what would atually work or be useful.
working on kids mental health.working on bullying and body image.working on social media and how to cope with todays world.
starting clubs and making it ok to be outside and doing active stuff again.
spending time with failies to make sure they can have qaulity time and meal times together,or at least learning how to give good balanced meals and snacks.
stress.
cooking in school.
this will all help chidlren obesity.not this.this is bull

Eating and drinking is banned on the Washington DC, Metro. I think it is insane to keep people from drinking water in a hot climate. And not eating on a long distance train? Madness. On the other hand, rats can be a problem.

www.wusa9.com/article/news/verify/verify-yes-eating-and-drinking-on-the-metro-is-still-prohibited/65-d446f2b4-6c45-4ed8-a3b3-7045553c8822

I'd ban adverts for junk food first. THIS is the problem. Adverts for sweets, fatty food and junk are relentless. They're on TV, billboards, phones. They are everywhere!

Banning food on trains etc. would have no impact and be unenforceable.

I don't think there should be a ban but I do think in general people need to calm down with snacks on trains. Literally every time I have gotten on a train in the last year, as soon as the doors close loads of people open up bags of crisps and other junk. These are train journeys of 20-50 minutes and at various times so not often over mealtimes. People need food, but literally no one NEEDS crisps, and it is disgusting to listen to people chomp them down, openmouthed, before licking each of their fingers.

A healthy adult can go 4-6 hours without eating, even if they have been "active". This is actually (or was reguarded) as perfectly normal. Breaskfast at 7:30, lunch at 1 (5 and a half hours), dinner at 7. This is how I eat every day if I am very busy I will sometimes not eat breakfast or skip lunch. It is good for your metabolism to "run on empty" for a bit.

Even if it’s less than an hour, I used to collect my dd’s from school at 3.30, race to the bus stop to get the bus to swimming for 4.30 so after changing after their lesson it would easily be 5.30 and they would have been starving without a small snack on the bus on the way. They are/still are starving coming out of school as teens and even the travelling similar journeys now -just the journey itself -makes them (and me) hungry. They couldn’t have eaten on arrival at the leisure centre as it would have been too close to the start of their lesson. If they couldn’t have eaten a snacks on the bus, they wouldn’t have been able to do the lessons at all. Counter productive- food ban would have = no exercise!

The funny thing is that when I travelled to work by public transport I was much skinner than I am now I travel by car. Walking to and from the station etc was great exercise!

I regularly do full day meetings with a working lunch in another city.

What this looks like in real life is:

7am leave the house after rushing around to get DD ready for school, no time for breakfast, make a coffee to drink on the way to the train station.

1hr train to London, then tube to Vauxhall, then walk to office.

12.30 - 'working lunch' = really shitty selection of stale sandwiches delivered to room, not enough for everyone so have maybe half a sandwich, spread out over an hour taking a bite in between discussions.

5.30 - meeting finishes, feeling a bit knackered from lack of food and being stuck in a room all day, rush to tube as need to get home ASAP to stand a chance of seeing DD before she falls asleep.

If I'm lucky I'll catch the 6.04 train in which case I'll have a bag of crisps and a chocolate bar from the trolley. If not I'll get a meal deal from m&s which I eat on the train.

The alternative would be waiting till after I have gotten home and put DD to bed so I would be eating my first real food of the day at about 8.30pm

I've tried taking lunch with me, but by the time it's been lugged about in a bag for a drive, walk, train, tube, walk and sat in a hot room for several hours, it's a bit manky.

I'm sure hot food is banned on TFL buses, but school kids get on all the time with their burgers and chicken drivers say nothing. I hate the smell and all the detritus kicking around the top deck, they never take their rubbish with them

Does this mean eating an 🍎 or a 🥕 on a bus would be banned?

It feels solely class based. It's talking about obese kids, who are statistically more likely to be poor and/or from BAME groups. It refers to 'junk food', again, something statistically more likely to be consumed by children from the same groups - and eating on the way to school is more likely when there isn't a nice breakfast bar with organic museli (no added sugar, naturally) and skimmed milk in the kitchen-diner before the angelic offspring are dropped off.

I think it’s bloody awful that someone in that position thinks they can take away peoples choices it’s big brother gone far to far. These people seem to think they know better than the rest of us it’s so patronising

These people seem to think they know better than the rest of us it’s so patronising yeah, bloody Chief Medical Officer! What does she know eh?!

. I don’t want to smell your oranges, eggs, tuna etc and to wonder if you’ve washed your hands beforehand and whether you will be able to wash your hands afterward (or just plan to lick your fingers) and if you intend to brush your teeth

I have seen someone rushing their teeth on the train. It wasnt any more attractive or pleasant than eating!!

brushing