[newshackr]

Given the tightness of airline seating and typical shoulder width for each gender, alternating male / female seating seems ideal space-wise.

[grantsh]

This is what happens when you leave decisions with social consequences to engineers... they end up optimizing to strange anti-social characteristics at the cost of any sort of social reality.

[solardev]

We could save even more space if we hooked up seating arrangements to TSA body scanners. Using body outlines, seating could be dynamically adjusted before boarding to ensure each passenger can optimally interlock legs with their neighbors. Lap sizes can determine the ideal vertical stacking, with overhead bins removed to save space now that the top passenger can hold all the carryon.

This approach might take a bit of getting used to, but just imagine the carbon savings.