To get irrationally angry at train behaviour

[MisanthropeLikely]

I'm not an angry person, but I'm thinking I might be becoming a Victor Meldrew when travelling. Particularly by train. Particularly long distance. Specific behaviour that enrages me:

1. People that have loud phone conversations or video calls on trains

1. People on long train journeys with limited space in the luggage rack who selfishly put their small bags on it rather than in the overhead, meaning people with larger cases have no space to put it

1. People who spend ages farting around standing in the aisle during boarding so no one can pass.

1. People who act like it's the Olympic 100m in their rush to get off

1. Men who manspread into the aisle

1. People who sit on your reserved seat and then refuse to move.

1. Lone travellers who take up 4 seater sections, preventing people in groups from sitting together

1. People who ostentatiously poo on trains. I mean, I get you sometimes have to go but some of the things people do are disgusting

1. Listening to music or watching videos with no headphones

10. Train stations that are massive but wait until 10 minutes before the train to tell you your platform so you need to have a stress race to make it with your bags.

11. People who wont move their bags off seats on an obviously full train.

I get irrationally angry about this stuff. My worst ever experiences were:

I was on a train once and this man had vrazely taken our reserved seats despite them being marked reserved and other empty seats. He'd set himself up some kind of fucking buffet on our table with a cloth and everything, then when I politely asked him to move, he told me to go and sit somewhere else because I was disturbing his meal.

Another time I was boarding a eurostar in an intense heatwave after a huge delay. It was roasting, I'd been standing at the gate for two solid hours in menopause sweats with a load of heavy bags. They started boarding. It's about 29 steps down to the platform, and a ramp os provided for people with luggage. The attendant was at the top of the ramp telling everyone who did not have luggage to take the stairs.

Anyway, there I am struggling to keep ny heavy suitcase from rolling right down the ramp and taking me with it, and some woman with no luggage at all aside from her small handbag decided to walk down the luggage ramp and overtake everyone on the inside. As there was no space, she moved her legs into my suitcase and then shouted at me "YOUR SUITCASE IS ON MY LEGS, WHY DONT YOU WATCH WHERE YIUR GOING"

I flushed bright red and said "I'm going downhill with a heavy bag I can barely control, multiple other bags and you walked into me trying to overtske", she turned and sniggered at me. A real deep, patronising snigger.

I still hold a grudge a year later.

Does anyone else experience these feelings or is it just me? I am petrified of flying so travel extensively by rail and I am at a point where I don't enjoy travelling because I feel so irrationally cross at inconsiderate and rude people.

Anyone else?

I guess I meant I wouldn't if there are other seats available. Partly because I'd rather not spend the journey facing someone I don't know!

Seats are seats. First, 2nd, or the wheelchair space is your choice, really. If you use trains regularly, you end up feeling lucky to get one, as there's about 50 percent of the time when you end up standing, sometimes right by an overflowing WC and a folded bike.

I would be likely to move for someone being polite...rude and petulant, not so much.

How rude.

My biggest annoyance is taking up more seats/table space than they need. Yes we’d all prefer a table of four for two people but it’s not luxury travel there are other passengers. We boarded a busy train and mother and daughter were having an afternoon tea type set up on the table of four, think sandwiches , scones and hot drink all laid out. No other seats available. Cue lots of tutting and eye rolling when we asked them to please move over and allow us to sit down.

Years ago maybe 2016? I was on a train with a boyfriend and sat down at a 4 seater with him and an elderly couple were there too. There was rubbish on the table which I assumed was theirs and thought nothing more. We got to our stop and she suddenly picks up rubbish and shoves it into my hands and tells me to throw our rubbish away. I said it wasn't ours but she said she didn't care. I threw it away but I still wish I'd thrown it back at her and told her and her husband to fuck off.
That and performance parenting on trains. Shut up already.

I anm not bothered about where people sit. I couldn’t care less. First come first served ( apart from reservations). Same with suitcase stuff. If people want to queue to rush off trains, the same 🤷‍♀️ let them pass, and get up when there’s calm and space 🙂.

However the noise of listening to videos and music without headphones totally infuriates me.

YANBU. People talking on mobiles in the quiet zone. Loud giggling and shouting across aisles.

YANBU. I'd also like to add the studiousness of people avoided making eye contact when I was heavily pregnant and on a packed train, when they were sitting in the disabled/pregnant seats. Yes, not every disability is visible and I totally accept 50% could have needed it, but given every time I asked if anyone could spare a seat someone got up, I find it hard to believe it was the majority. More than happy to stand while I was able (until about 35 weeks) but I was very clearly red-faced and struggling past that point.

Or, you know, there was a whole conversation where people mentioned they often need to work and there just isn’t enough space on airline seats to do that comfortably - which I hadn’t actually considered and think sounds reasonable. Someone else said people tend to spread out way beyond their quarter of the table, and I fully agreed -that is annoying.

This is just an anonymous Mumsnet thread about things that bug us on trains. Just to be super clear, I could not give even half a crumpled train ticket whether anyone agrees with me or not. If having internet strangers validate your travel pet peeves brings you joy, go for it—but I personally dont need that validation so please don't project it onto me.

Most functioning adults have conversations, listen to each other, and sometimes even change their mind or concede things are less annoying in certain circumstances.What’s a bit less charming is turning a light thread into an interrogation room.

Whatever floats your boat I guess.

I'm going to continue the chat now, during which I might listen and take on board things other people say. Or might not. It's a mumsnet thread about trains. I think we'll all be okay!

Having travelled by train extensively in Europe the best trains are Switzerland.
@MisanthropeLikely Oh I am with you on that.

Last year we travelled to the Italian Lakes - Eurostar to Paris, Paris to Zurich for an overnight stay then Zurich to Milan. Zurich station was excellent. I was able to find out our platform the night before travel and needless to say it left on time.

Not so good in Milan. Maybe we were unlucky but they seemed nearly as bad as Euston for not telling you the platform number until about 5 minutes before it's due to leave. Only nearly as bad. Typical when waiting for a train to Manchester to see a whole horde of people start to leg it for the gate at the same time when they finally get to announcing it.

You'd also see an exasperated mum trailing behind dragging luggage and younger DC calling after him "No DS it's fine, we can just sit here, we don't need a four, come back".

I'm not looking to shame anyone into moving but sometimes people do see the whole package of the agitated child + rest of family and let us sit together.

If I have a reserved seat then I am sitting in that and I will call the bloody guard and make you move. I chose my seat, so that it is forward facing by a window and not on an aisle so I will bloody have it.

I've only reserved on a couple of occasions as it was an 8 hour plus journey. Fortunately nobody had bothered to take my seat but other people were sitting in the reserved seats all around me which were not theirs and were adamant that nobody would claim them - they were right!

I agree with all the points you made @MisanthropeLikely. I see travelling by train as a test of my ability to remain a sane person. It's been severely tested at times

He's 10, he's pretty obviously neurodiverse in his behaviour and he gets agitated because however much I explain that people can sit where they want he doesn't get it. Group of four seats = for four people, in his mind.

The specific reason I find that incredibly annoying, is that people need to stand up to get their bags off overhead lockers, put their coat on and so on, and you can't do it comfortably because of people shoving past you while the train hasn't even arrived at the station yet. I understand some have connecting trains or somewhere to be, but most don't. They're just rude, grabby and impatient. They'll probably get off maybe 20 seconds earlier than if they'd just let people move.

Another one backtracking and trying to pretend she posted something completely different off the bat. What is it with this thread?

Funny how, having had a few people speak against you, you've changed your tune since the first post when you sounded proud/amused by your child's behaviour and implied that you sometimes allow it to 'shame' people into moving for you.

See when I was last pregnant everyone moved for me, but thats changed which I take as a sign of the downfall of civilisation.

Last time I was on a train a man did a poo that absolutely stunk and then the toilet doors got stuck open 🤦‍♀️

As someone who travels on trains a lot with kids I don’t agree. A singleton who wants to work on laptop or have a bit more table space isn’t doing something wrong and we all have the option to book in advance. We always book a table if we can and if we can’t and we find one with 3 seats one of us will sit there with the kids while the other grabs a lone seat elsewhere. It’s not a big thing.

Bookings are a good thing if you need to travel in a group or want a table seat, especially with youngish children and luggage. As well as online bookings, station staff can often help you at a window; some companies will book a specific seat for you even on the next train that's no more than 10 mins away rather than a day or week in advance. LNER, for example, had a mandatory reservation connected to the ticket, probably to try to strike a balance among all people paying their ticket price, whether they were already sitting there or about to get on.

It may be a one hour journey for you, but for other people it might be part of a longer journey and they've had to buy food to eat on the train as no time to sit and eat it in a cafe.

Why do you often have lots of bags? Try packing more efficiently.

@MisanthropeLikely Do you have views on people with excessive luggage, i.e more than they can feasibly carry or stow safely?

We recently had a horrible journey back from London, partly due to this. It wasn't helped by the fact the train before was cancelled so more people on our train. Fortunately reservations were still in place so we managed to get our booked seats and safely stow our (small) cases.

However a man then came into our carriage with two enormous cases and seemed to flap a bit before just abandoning them, only partly stowed. He then returned with his wife, a pram and a toddler, followed by yet more items of luggage. In total they must have had five large items of luggage plus the pram.

People were taking pity and trying to help; we moved our smaller cases to the overhead space so he could put his whopping great cases in the luggage racks. Even so he ended up with two cases blocking the aisle so it was very hard to get past. We had to get off before him and needed to leave our seats in good time as the only way we could get our stuff off was for me to climb over his cases and DH pass our bags to me then climb over himself.

Other people (some of whom also have children with additional needs) have said that they don't consider those needs an excuse for rude behaviour.