I do not feel bad for people who miss their flights or trains.

[joseline]

In general it is not hard at all to be on time. People miss flights or trains because of their own poor plannings, time management and irresponsibility.

when I travel by train from one city to another city far away, I see other travellers running to catch their trains. Sometimes they manage to make it onto their trains before they leave, a lot of time they miss them and they complain and throw a fit and sometimes even cry.

i always chuckle when I witness that because I know for sure that it is their fault. When I travel and I have a train or flight to catch I make sure to leave my house early to I can arrive early. At least 3 hours early. If I have a flight at 9 AM for example and the airline recommends me to be at the airport at 7 AM I am there at 6 AM. Of course I take myself to the airport so that nobody can dictate what I can and can’t do. I don’t let relatives take me to the airport anymore. I use uber or public transport.

the only time I’ve ever missed my flights or trains was when I travelled with older relatives. But ever since I started travelling solo, I never missed my flights or trains.

so when I am at the train stations or airport and I see people running, I feel 0 sympathy for them. They most likely loiter at home and decide to leave their homes close to the time of their departures.

It's pretty heartless of you to laugh at other people's troubles, self inflicted or not.

What's stopping you from living by the motto 'there but for the grace of God go I'? The fact that others are late doesn't affect your train or plane leaving on time after all.

Well my husband and I were rushing as fast as we were able at Edinburgh station recently to try to catch our London train. The train from our local station had been held up for some reason I can't remember and was about 20 minutes late, and to add insult to injury it then sat on the track for ages to allow another train to pass us. We arrived about five minutes after the departure time for the London train but thought it might have left late, but no such luck. I don't think that was our fault!

I've just remembered we missed a plane too a few years ago. We were meant to depart Edinburgh Airport for Heathrow at 4pm, arriving before 5.30pm. Flight to New Zealand left at 9pm. Surely even you couldn't argue with those timings?
Only there was a hole in the Heathrow runway and planes couldn't land, so we took off late and arrived at 8.55pm. Everyone lied to us that the plane would wait for us, or would be taking off late due to the hole. Arriving at Heathrow it was like the Marie Celeste, there was no one there to talk to. We had to stay in a hotel in London and get the same plane the next night. I don't think that was our fault either.

We missed a flight from Heathrow a few years ago, we’d planned to be there 4 hrs before the departure time and had a 2 hr drive to the airport so had actually allowed 3 hrs for the drive to account for any traffic and getting parked. It took 9 hours to get to the airport due to multiple closures along the M1. There’s just no way we could have accounted for that.

I’m one of those people who is always early for everything, I have a flight in October that requires being at the airport by 8:50am for an 11:50am departure. It’s the Monday of half term, so motorway traffic is likely to be a complete clusterfuck so I’m travelling down the night before and staying at an airport hotel to avoid it all and make sure I’m on time.

in general I would agree that most lateness is due to poor planning, but certainly not all.

Well aren't you miss goodie two shoes.......

And it's "whether" not "wether".
The latter means a 'castrated ram'.....

Or the M1, M6, M4, M11

Or most London bound trains.

I literally missed a flight because the train ahead of mine caught on fire so the track was closed. After being at a dead stop on the tracks, we moved on to the next station (not on itinerary, normally would have zipped past it). We were eventually put on busses not to London, but Eastwards to get to another London bound train route.

A 1hr train to KingsX ended up taking 4.5hrs.

Only 2? Bet OP carries 4 as she’s soooo prepared!!

No amount of early is going to make up for expected delay. Unless you are suggesting leaving 5 hours early which even you don’t so 🤷🏻‍♀️
you can’t have travelled much if you think all delays are the passenger’s fault. Perhaps you ought to get out more

Well, aren’t you a treat!

I suspect you aren't a mum, even though you are on mumsnet. You not only boast about having no empathy, but your cruelty is the delight you experience in watching others suffer .
That would not be a pleasant environment to raise a child, you could do untold damage. Please seek help.

Incorrect.

Last month I had to travel via Frankfurt airport. For some reason, people on transfer flights were required to leave the secure area and then to undergo security checks again. Some passengers missed their second flight through no fault of their own - security were working at a snail's pace.

I once had someone drive into the back of my rental car in France as I was driving to the airport...because they were not paying attention and texting. I had left with a massive amount of spare time, but the shock and having to deal with exchanging details in French took time and meant I got to the airport as they closed the desk.
Not my fault. But good to know you would have been laughing you smug tit.
Do you turn up to parties early too? Just so you know, no one likes that.

Hope that was all on one booking. Wouldn't have risked that on separate flights lol

My train was cancelled on Thursday and we had to wait an hour for the next one. Absolute carnage on that train and we were stuck behind a local stopping service

🙄 I’m sure there are people that just dilly dally and don’t plan well, but any seasoned worldwide traveler will understand that it’s never always just down to people piddling around and poor planning.

I am very much in the camp of getting to the airport 3 hours early, leaving a layover of at least 2 hours ( 3-4 hours is the sweet spot) but even then there’s been times I’ve just caught my flight etc because of super slow immigration. Just got back from China, again and I already heard about their slow immigration for transit flight and should always leave minimum 2 hours but the first time I went it was reasonably quick ( only about 1 hour) second time I had a 3 hour layover and the immigration line I was in had less than 20 people took close to 3 hours and I just had 5 minutes to spare before the connecting flight was ready to board.

sometimes even the best laid plans can be messed up by slow ass immigration with 1 person deciding to grill all the Russian tourists in front of you! Myself and the one other British passport holder behind me were hardly asked anything and done within 5 minutes ( which surprised me as I thought China and Russia had a better relationship)

Another example, flight for whatever reason didn’t leave on time from LHR had 3.5 hours layover in Doha then on to Manila by the time it arrived in Doha, me and my son had to run and luckily we caught the tail end of the boarding… this was not poor planning, it was Qatar airways poor planning! I left a decent amount of time between flights, I’m also too chicken to book flights with 1 hour layovers because I do factor in potential delays and I don’t want to have to deal with being transferred to a new flight etc, but I have to draw the line somewhere and even with 3 hour + layovers or leaving the house in good time that doesn’t guarantee there won’t be an accident on the motorway while you are on the way to catch that train or get to the airport or a flight won’t be delayed ( so making it a pain to make your connection) despite being the first in line to check in and leaving over 3 hours for the layover

I agree. That is not the kind of risk I would take and that’s what I would actually consider iffy planning… I wouldn’t say it’s necessarily poor planning because if everything runs on time it’s fine but if it doesn’t then it’s also poor planning for cutting it fine like that ( I assume it was cheaper to get the flight from London so flew in from Scotland or if all on one ticket I’d have left Scotland way earlier)

I have done something similar in that it was cheaper for me to get a flight from Rome which departed at 9.30pm BUT I got there the night before and just stayed at a super cheapo hotel, no way on earth would I risk going the same day even if its a 7am flight from London I wouldn’t do it, the only time I would risk it is if flying from Paris because I have the option of Eurostar or plane if one cocks up I can go with the other and I will be getting the first departure train/plane from London with a flight leaving Paris anytime from 7pm onwards

Well you sound charming. Have you considered sometimes missing a train or flight might not actually be their own fault ? For example we were recently in Prague and got a taxi to the airport we gave ourselves extra time as we always do. However we were stuck in a traffic jam due to an accident. We did manage to catch our flight but to think of someone like you chuckling makes my blood boil.

I've missed or nearly missed 4 flights, on each occasion I needed to run to meet the flight.

Never have I missed a flight due to tardiness on my part. Three times I have missed or nearly due to a connection and the first flight departing late Once because of a delay resulting in bags being held in security and then not checked resulting in a back up.

On each occasion it caused huge stress and upset, but if that's your thing, crack on! You do you and I hope @joseline learning how my teenager was physically sick and crying from the stress of nearly missing a connection brings extra sparkle to your day.....

Not sure it's worth getting worked up about a post like this - just a lonely slightly odd person. Nobody really gets pleasure from something as bizarre as this

I really hope you're sitting somewhere on the spectrum - because I honestly cannot imagine being this emotionally inept.

Seriously, imagine not understanding that people get sick, cars breakdown, accidents happen...no, no just assume everyone loiters instead of getting ready and leaving early, that totally makes more sense......🙄🤦🏻‍♀️

I hate waiting around. I get to the airport an hour before (increased to 1.5 hrs since kids) always breezed through security, never had to sit around bored out of my mind waiting. Always the last one on the plane (I hate those people who stand up for half an hour pointlessly queuing at the gate when they already have an assigned seat). Never missed a flight, never had to do the stressful plane dash. Bet you hate people like me 😆

When you're stuck outside a connecting train station for half an hour, and there's no sign of the train moving anytime soon ; how is that your fault? Or many other similar scenarios that aren't your fault.
I think you're just trolling.

We had a flight delayed by 12 hours once!!! Anyone who had been ‘clever’ like you and booked a super early flight to get somewhere for a connection still would have missed it!
I’ve always booked a hotel near the airport for the night before I fly… BUT not everyone can do that.

I feel very sorry for them. It has happened to me when we missed a flight. It was absolutely horrendous.

Mmmm…. Originally, I responded to your title with a post where I said that I do feel sorry for them.
However, I have now read your full post and I suspect it is a wind-up to get a reaction from posters.
The giveaway for me is that you ‘chuckle’ when you see people upset that they have missed their train. Designed to incense readers.