Will British trains become too cramped for 2+2 seating?

[Bletchleyite]

Using someone's "standing" measurements isn't the correct thing to do, even for a mildly overweight person, because people "spread out" when they sit down due to increased pressure on hips etc. There will be a cross over point at which this is more important than shoulder width and I'm not sure where but I think it'll be before obesity, possibly even before being overweight.

Let's get the tape measure out

My shoulders are roughly 55cm wide, my backside and upper thighs are 50cm wide seated (which means I fit within a typical 45cm seat base width as long as there's an armrest spacer and window side spacer as that gives you that 50cm...just!) And I am rugby sort of build and definitely fat. (Obese by BMI, but BMI doesn't work very well for very muscular builds so I'm probably really just overweight). However my shoulders do overhang slightly, usually I mitigate this by leaning into the window space which means I don't like windowless "window" seats

I agree there will be a point, but I think for men shoulder width is more of a thing. I'm definitely not "V shaped", but a lot of men are. Bashing shoulders or having to lean sideways I find much more common than legs touching.

Women will generally be wider at seat level than shoulders, but women are generally smaller anyway. Talking of 3+2, that's one reason why male-female-male or female-male-female tends to work better than three of each on the 3 side!

Not saying there aren't men wider at the backside than the shoulders while seated, but I don't think it's likely to be very many of the population. Women, certainly.

 

[HSTEd]

Why does it have to be magical?

Fat jab technology is getting better all the time and more to the point the NHS is (glacially) rolling it out as it's far more cost effective* than reactive healthcare. There are already very encouraging signs that obesity has peaked and is starting to reverse; having these things free at the point of use can be expected to accelerate that. In other words I don't think this issue is going to get any worse and the status quo (where fat buggers like me either go 1st, stand, bring a thin person or take emptier trains) seems to work fine.

In other words I'm not convinced there's an issue that needs solving here.

*in terms of healthcare. It's actually worse for the budget due to increased pension payments

The rollout is so glacial that it is going to be decades before they can meaningfully impact obesity on the population scale.
Obesity may have peaked, but we have yet to see any evidence of significant population scale decline, and it was always going to peak because obviously obesity can't climb forever.

I don't think its reasonable to just assume everyone is going to revert to 50s body shape even by the end of the century.

And that doesn't solve the coupled issue that people are physically bigger than they used to be due to radically improved health and nutrition.

It also doesn't help much with the larger cases and move to overhead racks clogging the aisles.

 

[Bletchleyite]

I don't think its reasonable to just assume everyone is going to revert to 50s body shape even by the end of the century.

And that doesn't solve the coupled issue that people are physically bigger than they used to be due to radically improved health and nutrition.

Precisely. Even if every single person in the country suddenly had 5% body fat, their shoulders wouldn't narrow and their legs wouldn't get any less muscular nor long.

 

[Mikey C]

Southern's commuters absolutely seem to avoid them. I think longitudinal is probably best for suburban trains. The 378s are great at scooping up passengers on the overcrowded trains to Croydon and Crystal Palace.

The 378s are 4 or 5 car trains. When the mainline network can run trains of 8, 10 or 12 car 20m stock, there is no need for such uncomfortable seating.

I avoid middle seats when flying because it's the worst of both worlds - you get neither the views from the window nor the convenience of easy toilet access or room to stretch out. I am very much an aisle passenger, not necessarily for my size (though I am overweight) but the comfort. Though I also have mild claustrophobia which plays a part in not wanting to be 'trapped' by a window or middle seat.

Nobody likes middle seats on planes, but there is a massive difference between being stuck for several hours on a plane in the middle seat, and sitting in one for 30 minutes on a commuter train. 3+2 train will rarely be completely packed for the whole journey, as people get on and off at intermediate stations.

 

[Tetchytyke]

Using someone's "standing" measurements isn't the correct thing to do, even for a mildly overweight person, because people "spread out" when they sit down due to increased pressure on hips etc.

I have a fair amount of chonk and you are right, people do spread out.

However my bum and my belly doesn't spread out further than my shoulders. I sit with my arms folded across my belly and the widest part of me is my shoulder blades. My shoulder blades were still the widest part of me when I was at my smallest, and they weren't really any narrower than they are now.

The issue isn't people being overweight or being obese, the issue is that seats are too small for the people expected to sit in them. According to Google Gemini (usual disclaimers apply), the average shoulder width for a man is 16.2 inches- and this is measured from the bony bit on each shoulder joint, so it doesn't factor into any muscle or fat the person may have.

For context, the seat width on a Class 350/2 is, from memory, 16.5 inches. So the average adult male physically cannot fit in the seat (even the most slender of men will have biceps of more than 0.15 inches on each side.) I've not been able to find specific measurements but, having ridden on them, I'd be surprised if the seats on the Class 720 (which absolutely should not have been specified as 3+2) or the Class 707 were any wider.

 

[Bletchleyite]

The two standard sizes you seem to get are 45cm and 43.5cm. The 730/0 which has the same seats as the 720 but in 2+2 layout without armrests are the 43.5cm version as I've measured them. I seem to recall the cab end 2+2 priority seats in the 720 are 45cm wide. The 730/2 has the 45cm wide variant with armrests.

The seats in all varieties of 350 are 45cm wide, just they either come with or without armrests. This is further confirmed by me having seen blue seat cushions in 350/2s before The 350/2 ones look narrower, but this is just because the upper seat back is a different shape with less pronounced "wings" than the /1, /3 and /4.

The really inconsistent one is Merseyrail 777s, where some seats are spaced away from the sidewall and some are not, seemingly randomly. I suspect this is just yet another example of the utterly shoddy build quality of these units, as the seats used in these are mounted on rails it looks like different people put them in a different position on the rail.

 

[HSTEd]

I seem to recall that some Mark 1 coaches were built with short bodyframes to allow them handle some especially tight gauging somewhere.

Shorter vehicles traditionally allow wider bodies because of overhang, is there any sense that 20m is as short as they can go before width stops increasing?

Because with full width gangways and articulation, we could potentially go much shorter!

 

[Bletchleyite]

Shorter vehicles traditionally allow wider bodies because of overhang, is there any sense that 20m is as short as they can go before width stops increasing?

I'm fairly sure 2.82m is the widest UK stock has generally gone, and that can be done in a 20m body that will fit in most if not all places on the network.

To be fair the 323 manages 2.80m in a 23m body but it's heavily tapered at the ends.

Because with full width gangways and articulation, we could potentially go much shorter!

With articulation your bogie centres are still the same as a fixed vehicle, so you can't go wider just because the vehicle is only 16m long rather than 20m, or you'll whack the platform with the middle bit of the body. That'll be one reason why the UK Stadlers are so narrow (bar the 777 which is 2.82m because it's built specifically to the loading gauge and curvature on Merseyrail and wouldn't necessarily fit elsewhere). Class 166 is 2.81m wide but I suspect may not fit everywhere.

 

[HSTEd]

With articulation your bogie centres are still the same as a fixed vehicle, so you can't go wider just because the vehicle is only 16m long rather than 20m, or you'll whack the platform with the middle bit of the body. That'll be one reason why the UK Stadlers are so narrow (bar the 777 which is 2.82m because it's built specifically to the loading gauge and curvature on Merseyrail and wouldn't necessarily fit elsewhere). Class 166 is 2.81m wide but I suspect may not fit everywhere.

Well I'd see articulation as primarily a method of moving the bogie centres closer together.
Once you get shorter than about 15m bogie centres your bogies will start to take up a significant portion of the length of the train, which could ruin your underfloor volume for equipment.

Articulation allows you to go shorter without ending up with a train made up entirely of bogies underneath.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Are you thinking of those "worm like" modern trams with very short articulated sections? I really dislike those, they're a huge compromise on internal layout. I'd rather the vehicle was narrower than that we had to suffer that on the mainline.

 

[HSTEd]

Are you thinking of those "worm like" modern trams with very short articulated sections? I really dislike those, they're a huge compromise on internal layout. I'd rather the vehicle was narrower than that we had to suffer that on the mainline.

Probably not to that extreme , but you could go more wormlike.

But personally I'd suggest the long term solution is to do something about the loading gauge, although that would be very expensive in the medium term.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Probably not to that extreme , but you could go more wormlike.

But personally I'd suggest the long term solution is to do something about the loading gauge, although that would be very expensive in the medium term.

Doing something about sidewall construction thickness might well be easier - the extra couple of inches internal width on a 350 make quite a lot of difference. Also stop building vehicles with a tilt profile that will never tilt, though that largely seems to have been resolved with the move from the *star to the Aventra which is much squarer. (Though 20m Aventras do waste width, they're the same width as 24m ones).

Also there are things you can do to take advantage of width, e.g. make window frames squarer and with a flat edge so someone who is tall and broad can lean one arm on the windowsill without it falling off. The same with floor level conduits - if we must have them give them a flat top so we can put our feet up on them.

 

[JamesT]

Doing something about sidewall construction thickness might well be easier - the extra couple of inches internal width on a 350 make quite a lot of difference. Also stop building vehicles with a tilt profile that will never tilt, though that largely seems to have been resolved with the move from the *star to the Aventra which is much squarer. (Though 20m Aventras do waste width, they're the same width as 24m ones).

I wouldn't be surprised to find that thicker side construction is needed to meet modern crash safety standards.

 

[HSTEd]

I wouldn't be surprised to find that thicker side construction is needed to meet modern crash safety standards.

It may also be the result of adopting aluminium sections to reduce weight.

A duplex stainless steel construction (for example) may well end up thinner walled.

 

[Bletchleyite]

I wouldn't be surprised to find that thicker side construction is needed to meet modern crash safety standards.

Have they changed that much since the 350? Anyone seen any brand new Siemens kit on the mainland?

The 700 has a sidewall the same thickness as the 350. It'll be down to construction.

The 80x also have a fairly thin sidewall which helps those (to me) alongside the squareness very spacious.

 

[Tetchytyke]

This is further confirmed by me having seen blue seat cushions in 350/2s before The 350/2 ones look narrower, but this is just because the upper seat back is a different shape with less pronounced "wings" than the /1, /3 and /4.

A quick Google suggests the seats in the 350/2 are 16.5 inches, which would be about 42cm. But all the usual caveats apply with Google. It's not the sort of thing which is well advertised, funnily enough!

It also depends on how you measure the seats, I suppose. If you take it as the width of the seat back then you get one measurement. If you take it from the centreline of the armrests then that will add a couple of inches to the actual usable width of the seat, which is really what we're interested in. Obviously the 350/2s don't have armrests and so, on the 2-side of the 3+2 you'd be losing at least 2 inches of usable space (one full armrest plus one half-armest).

 

[Bletchleyite]

There's a data sheet on Grammer's website (attached, but hard to quote as it's mostly graphical) that gives widths as 440mm, 450mm or 460mm. I'm almost certain all the 350s are 450mm but I obviously can't get on a /2 now to check!

Interestingly it appears Grammer have withdrawn from rail passenger seating, they no longer list any current rail passenger seat products on their website, which is a shame.

 

[Egg Centric]

The rollout is so glacial that it is going to be decades before they can meaningfully impact obesity on the population scale.
Obesity may have peaked, but we have yet to see any evidence of significant population scale decline, and it was always going to peak because obviously obesity can't climb forever.

I don't think its reasonable to just assume everyone is going to revert to 50s body shape even by the end of the century.

And that doesn't solve the coupled issue that people are physically bigger than they used to be due to radically improved health and nutrition.

It also doesn't help much with the larger cases and move to overhead racks clogging the aisles.

Well the point was about us needing to redesign trains in future to cope, when imo the current designs are fine.

I do however half concede the point to @Bletchleyite and @Tetchytyke - after a bit of looking in the mirror I'm wider bicep to bicep than (idk word? bum side to bumside?) - but otoh I'm a lot wider there than I think I would be otherwise, as I assume I wouldn't be a body builder if I were thin. So presumably obesity affects that somewhat? I mean, it must do otherwise fat people wouldn't be a problem in economy on flights and so on?

 

[Bletchleyite]

Well the point was about us needing to redesign trains in future to cope, when imo the current designs are fine.

I do however half concede the point to @Bletchleyite and @Tetchytyke - after a bit of looking in the mirror I'm wider bicep to bicep than (idk word? bum side to bumside?) - but otoh I'm a lot wider there than I think I would be otherwise, as I assume I wouldn't be a body builder if I were thin. So presumably obesity affects that somewhat? I mean, it must do otherwise fat people wouldn't be a problem in economy on flights and so on?

Some planes have particularly narrow seats, in particular 3-4-3 777s and 3-3-3 787s which have 17" or narrower seats, which is 43.18cm, or narrower than the seats on the Class 720 (albeit with armrests). With the best will in the world my shoulders aren't going to fit in that width regardless of my belly!

I don't think there is a major issue for now with 45cm seats with armrests in a 2.75ish metre wide body, to be honest. It's a bit tight for me, but not impossibly so, and I am considerably bigger than average. Though people do seem to be getting bigger it mostly seems to be in height, which doesn't require major changes, just fewer seats per vehicle to space them out more.

 

[HSTEd]

Well the point was about us needing to redesign trains in future to cope, when imo the current designs are fine.

The ongoing drivers for reduced dwell times and increased seating capacity do seem to be pulling in opposite directions though.

Even if people don't keep getting bigger and/or get smaller, we still end up with loading and unloading trains when busy being very slow.

Dwell times in platforms are an increasingly important limit on capacity after all.

 

[Bletchleyite]

The ongoing drivers for reduced dwell times and increased seating capacity do seem to be pulling in opposite directions though.

Is the call for increased seating capacity? Intercity trains are generally getting lower density, while regional ones are typically being designed for more standees with lower, not increased, seating capacity.

The last train to be designed purely to maximise seating capacity was the seriously misguided Class 720 which I suspect is deeply regretted. By contrast the 730/0 has far fewer seats than the 323, but far more standing room.

 

[HSTEd]

Is the call for increased seating capacity? Intercity trains are generally getting lower density, while regional ones are typically being designed for more standees with lower, not increased, seating capacity.

The last train to be designed purely to maximise seating capacity was the seriously misguided Class 720 which I suspect is deeply regretted. By contrast the 730/0 has far fewer seats than the 323, but far more standing room.

Hasn't the trend in intercity trains been for more density, with falling numbers of tables and more and more airline seats? Reduce luggage rack provision and greater reliance on overheads.

Or maybe I am just 15 years out of date.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Hasn't the trend in intercity trains been for more density, with falling numbers of tables and more and more airline seats? Reduce luggage rack provision and greater reliance on overheads.

Or maybe I am just 15 years out of date.

I think that was the trend up to and including the Pendolino, but the various 80x (particularly once the extra racks were added) have very much gone back the other way. Even the 810, the most cramped of the 80x this side of Lumo (which is a special case) has a lower density than the 222s it will replace (considerably more seats, to be fair, but that's because the 22x is so badly designed, with seats only in about 2/3 of each vehicle). And then you've got stuff like the 195 which has a very low density layout, and the lowest density modern layout in the 805 and 807, which are very low density with a lot of tables (luggage space between seat backs), and the even-more-tables layout in the 397.

Larger overheads are certainly a trend (and a good thing that indeed is) but that's just returning to the days of the Mk1 and the Mk2 after a period of very small ones in the 2000-2010 ish builds. It was always nonsense to build 22x, 170, 175 and the Electrostar fleets with such tiny overheads that they wouldn't even take an IATA carry-on. The ones in a Voyager barely fit your coat.

 

[Nottingham59]

Once you get shorter than about 15m bogie centres your bogies will start to take up a significant portion of the length of the train, which could ruin your underfloor volume for equipment.

But surely one bogie every 15m is less intensive than two bogies per 26m carriage in an 80x?

 

[Bikeman78]

That simply isn’t true. When traveling on some very busy trains around Manchester before Christmas during the great flu panic (amongst politicians and in the media anyway) I was thinking just how little Covid has apparently changed people’s behaviour. Nobody looked particularly distressed at being crammed in and not a mask in sight.

Agreed. People just pile on until the train is rammed. Facebook and news outlets made a big deal about flu in December but out in the real world people carried on as normal.

 

[HSTEd]

Agreed. People just pile on until the train is rammed. Facebook and news outlets made a big deal about flu in December but out in the real world people carried on as normal.

I definitely think the posture of people sitting next to strangers has changed though. I see a lot more perch more on the aisle side of the seat or slew out into the aisle.

 

[Bikeman78]

I definitely think the posture of people sitting next to strangers has changed though. I see a lot more perch more on the aisle side of the seat or slew out into the aisle.

Also agreed. Walking through an 800 earlier was quite a challenge.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 22 Jan 2026 ==

I'm sitting on a 701 now. The seats are jammed right up against the wall. It would be horrible if someone were sitting next to me. The 455s have a two inch gap between wall and seat, and a similar gap between the seats. They still have a reasonably wide aisle.

 

[Grumpy]

Class 166 is 2.81m wide but I suspect may not fit everywhere.

Is anything published that shows where they might fit? Although built to fit Paddington/Marylebone commuter services they seem to fit the likes of Portsmouth, Gatwick, Barnstaple etc, and I believe they were built at York.
A 23m long, 2.81m wide unit with 2+3 seating would be an efficient shortish distance commuter carrier

 

[MattRat]

More people drive everywhere, and if you mention a 10 minute walk to the train station to them, they look at you like you have 3 heads.

We might feel the need to not shame people, but I think we all know things are getting worse in terms of health.

Then again, with more people too lazy to get the train and using the car instead, the problem on trains solves itself, since they won't be there to cause the problem

 

[supervc-10]

Some planes have particularly narrow seats, in particular 3-4-3 777s and 3-3-3 787s which have 17" or narrower seats, which is 43.18cm, or narrower than the seats on the Class 720 (albeit with armrests). With the best will in the world my shoulders aren't going to fit in that width regardless of my belly!

The worst flight I've had in years was when I was in a window seat of a 10-abrest 777 with a very, very, large and deeply rude and unpleasant woman next to me on a flight from London to New York. It was torture. I'm 187cm (6'2) and 105kg (230lb), and into my fitness (ex rugby player, now more just lifting/bodybuilding). I've not flown economy on a 777 or 787 since, and I'm relieved I'm in the privileged position that I can afford to do that.

The big thing for me though is less the seat width, but the 'horizontal' pitch if you will. Regular pitch is from one seat to the same point on the seat behind it (in airline style configurations), but the distance from the centreline of one seat to the one next to it is just as important. People say that premium economy is only an inch or two wider (on BA's Airbus A350s, it's only 0.7 inches!) but the wider armrests make a huge difference, because the shoulders aren't clashing.

People have talked about the absolute hellhole that is a 720. The actual seats are fine (not good- just fine) for what they're used for - but the 'horizontal pitch' is terrible. Get rid of the 3rd seat, put in slight spacers to move them away from the wall and each other and the 720 would be a decent enough train IMO.

My husband is also a big guy - we physically can't fit on a 720 2-seat bench together.