Last week I posted a pre-deregulation seat map of an American Airlines Boeing 727-100 and I thought it would be interesting to compare it against a version flying the skies eight years later for this installment of Vintage Airline Seat Maps.
American pulled out one row of First Class, removed the coat compartment and bar from coach and likely tightened the seat pitch to offer 115 seats in this version versus the 100-seater I posted last week. First Class lost only four seats and economy gained 19 in the reconfiguration.
You’d find me sitting in 5A or 5F in First Class or in the first few rows of coach forward of the mid-cabin galley.
Where would you sit?
I can tell you those rows in the back, the ones in the smoking section or just in front of the smoking section were no fun. Engine roar and smoke filled — not a good combination.
I began flying for AA in 1984 and worked the -100, as we called it, MANY times…Everything from LGA-YYZ and LGA-DTW (AA used to be a fierce competitor in the DTW market) to EWR-DFW, RDU-CUN, DFW-CUN-CZM and ORD-PDX-EUG to name a few. It really was not our favorite plane to work because of the single galley in the middle which made it really difficult to do the elaborate services we did back then…Both First Class and Coach were served out of the same galley.
We called the coach section behind First Class and forward of the galley, “The Twilight Zone.” The configuration changed again n 1987 when they ripped out the old galleys and put in galleys that accomodated carts. I think the configuration increased to 10 and 108 or 118.
@John: Thanks for the insight… love the “twilight zone” name.