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?

I think the editor was having a laugh when he decided to put this advert for junk food on the front page of a paper that is given out every weekday on buses and trains

I agree Joyful it’s not 1950. Men aren’t going home to their wives at 6pm for a cooked dinner and women aren’t just at home waiting for them.

Women work. Men and women work long hours. And work through lunch. And attend meetings at different sites. And commute. And look after children. And care for elderly parents. And volunteer in their communities. And have hobbies.

I’m never going to choose a Marks and Spencer’s sandwich on the train over dinner at the ivy, but that sandwich might be the what I need to do on a particular day to fit everything in that I need to do. And frankly, the people who want to take my sandwich can fuck off.

When going between meetings in London on public transport, eating on a train is the only opportunity I have for lunch.
It's unworkable.

The Japanese do not eat or drink on the streets or on public transport - it’s seen as bad manners. The streets are very clean as a result, and the public transport doesn’t smell or get covered in litter and crumbs. Works well there, but it’s not banned, just bad manners and respected as not the done thing.

But you can't suddenly impose such a cultural change on the British public.

I eat my lunch on the bus going between two jobs when I haven't got the car. Needs must, I would love a full time job but they are in short supply here so I go from one to another. I'm not alone... remember all these rules proposed affect the poor disproportionately because (here)everyone else drives. I can't afford my own car so share stbexh's one. The bus takes over twice as long as driving

Honestly it's only 1-2 generations ago that it was culturally frowned upon here too. Anyone who went to a posh(ish) school in the 1960/50s wouldn't have been allowed to eat in public (except in a cafe) in their uniform for example

I agree with Ali. I'm a teacher and if I have an after work meeting I get a sandwich for the train as otherwise I'm straight into DD's bedtime on arriving home and would have to choose between eating or preparing my lessons for the next day. I imagine most of the other people eating are on similar schedules.

The solution to this involves looking at working and commuting patterns, not just dealing with the symptoms.

I do remember as a schoolgirl in the 1980s we were regularly ordered by our headmistress not to eat or drink in the street. It was seen as unladylike (wonder what they told the boys...)

How about enforcing actual breaks at work with sit down areas away from people’s desks?
Schools with pleasant canteens kids can actually sit and relax in during their lunch break?
People I know don’t eat in the run cause they like it, it’s cause they’ve not had a chance to eat all day otherwise.

It would be difficult to change the culture of eating everywhere. Other countries like Hong Kong, have a ban of eating on public transport and it works for them.

Had a situation yesterday where I had not eaten breakfast and was busy all day doing various things. Was about and about but didn't have time to stop to have some lunch, so bought I sandwich to eat 'on the hoof'. It's not something I would ever normally do but sometimes needs must.

And how exactly would they define medical need. When I was commuting while pregnant I needed to eat crackers on the train or I got horribly travel sick. Is that a medical need? Sometimes on a hot London tube I feel a little light headed and something sugary helps, I don't think that's a medical need but it's still a need.

It's inhumane to ban food on public transport.

It’s our environment which makes us the way we are. Look at Americans- they aren’t overweight cause they are lazy it’s because you have to drive everywhere and junk food is easiest option. Research has shown the people that live the longest in the world live in healthy environments- so have to walk, no easy access to fast food. People banging on about nanny state are silly. Everyone said that when smoking ban came in and that had done so much good. Also many other good recommendations in report but the media focusing only on this ...

The idea has many flaws, but I don't think she's completely wrong either. I think we do need to get back to the place where it should be the exception rather than the rule. I am in my forties and old enough to remember when there were very few options for casual eating when you were out of your house. They were:

McDonalds - only in town centres
The cafes in Debenhams and other large shops
Sandwich bars near offices, only open at lunchtimes
Ye olde tea shop - if you lived in a tourist place
Newsagents

There were food vendors at train stations, but far fewer than there are today. People did still buy and eat food that they hadn't cooked themselves, but the habits were different. It was all far less mobile. If you bought a takeaway, you took it home. You drank your cup of coffee in the café. You took your sandwich bar lunch back to the office. No one walked around with a takeaway cup.
Where did we go wrong? Probably as packaging and availability improved, so people's habits changed.

I even remember travel sweets! Probably a hangover from earlier decades, but they were sold in a metal tin in pharmacies, presumably as something small, discreet and acceptable that you could eat on a car or train journey.

For what it's worth, I don't think alcohol should be permitted on trains either. I commute into London and have spent many a journey home sitting next to middle aged men who drink 1-2 beers in the course of a 40 minute journey at 7pm. It's smelly and unnecessary.

It's inhumane to ban food on public transport
Yeah, it's right up there with solitary confinement and capital punishment.

It’s our environment which makes us the way we are

It's the other way around, we shape out environment.

Just because driving and fast food are the easiest options doesn't mean you have to go for that option.

I don't think you should ever need to eat outside a house or a restaurant, unless its a picnic or a really really long journey. It's perfectly possible for most healthy people to not eat for 4 hours.

Do you commute into London? Say DH and I have lunch at 1 pm in his office; then we get to the station at 6.30 pm to read signs there are NO trains on our line home, and we have to use any other way home! This means catching the tube to a major terminus and trying to get on a long distance train, which stops somewhere in our county - they have their own passengers already, so it’s hard to get onto one of these trains, as they are jam packed! If we are lucky, our train operator lays on buses from said town to our home town - but we may stand an hour outside in the snow, waiting for a bus. We finally get home at 9.30 pm, cold, starving and stressed! Eight and a half hours after we last ate! Twice recently, DH has had to get the tube to the edge of London, and I had to drive 20 miles to pick him up!

This happens regularly and you think there is no need to eat, except in the house or restaurant?

Well academic studies have shown it is our environment that shapes us (see the blue zone studies about places where people live the longest, as humans we take the easiest option - America case in point, sometimes it’s impossible to actually walk anywhere in America) but let’s not listen to the experts as usual 🙄

And what shapes our environment?

At the moment a lot of corporations trying to make money!!! If government would put more public health measures in place - like they did with the smoking ban (which has now shown to have decreased smoking and is a case in point of how our environment shapes us) then more people would have a chance at a healthier life. It’s not a case of willpower, that’s been shown to be nonsense.

My god, can people not take responsibility for their own obesity. Bloody nanny state !!!

If I want to eat rubbish food on a train journey I should be well within my rights to do that, I'm not over weight, I understand smelly food can be a bit offensive, but it's hardly the end of the world. We are becoming so intolerant of anything !!!

If the government is so worried about obesity, invest in decent school meals for children whilst in school.

And what shapes our environment?

Lack of regulation and greed. If a company can make a meal for 20p out of the cheapest crap and sell it for £2.99 and it sells, then they will. They don't care if a healthy version costs them 20p more than the cheapest crap that they do sell. As it sells easily and not many people can afford to frequently buy the £5.99 microsalad that doesn't fill you up, the shops that sell the cheapest crap can afford to expand.

The not eating on public transport probably only works in places like Japan because they have a culture of eating out after a long day of work and have the choice of being able to buy cheap healthy fast food whereas we don't have that option in the UK.

Oh yes, it's always someone else's fault for making you do things. The big corporations, evil though they might be, don't shove fast food in your mouth and don't forcefully put you in a car. The suggestion of banning snaking on the trains was not about the deepest America where there's public transport once a week, but for local trains here.