The Quiet Carriage should be Quiet...

The Quiet Carriage should be Quiet... This is a 12 coach train. It is less than half full. There is only one quiet carriage. Why do you need to bring your small, loud, active, child into the coach where everyone else is trying to work? Continuously raising and dropping seat arms may not be specifically prohibited, but the sound can be heard through the entire carriage. Allowing your child to do this because it keeps them quiet...is absolute rubbish and makes you daft. If they are making noise then by definition they are not being quiet. It is worse when it is not their arm-rest they are raising and lowering – and I am not lifting my arm to let them play with mine. Not co-operating with your child's request does not make me a bad person. The fact the request was made and you expect me to go along with it instead of getting out of your seat at the far end of the carriage and managing your child makes you a bad parent. This shouldn't happen anywhere, but in the quiet carriage with signs up all over the walls about not disturbing other passengers? That's just rude. No, the child may not be playing music but their feet drumming on the back of the seat in front of them is probably louder. You may be reading to them quietly, but if that reading is interrupted throughout by high volume happy squeals, it doesn't belong in the quiet coach. When the reading involves them slapping their book against the chair in front, it is likewise not quiet. If every five minutes you are shouting at Matthew (or Damien as the rest of us dubbed him) to stop that, then he's not quiet, nor are you and neither of you belong in the quiet carriage. No, leaving the pushchair outside does not make it OK to bring your noisy child into the quiet carriage – it's obviously not the pushchair that's making the noise. If your child is talking quietly and can be heard from the far end of the quiet carriage, then they aren't talking quietly. If your child is quiet – not quiet for them, not making happy squeals, not drumming feet, quiet – then bring them into the quiet carriage. If not then, please, on a long haul train, use one of the other eleven carriages. Read more. This blog has moved to http://www.rablogs.co.uk/tirial where the original articles can be found.