What makes watching airplane taxiing so relaxing?

I find anything relaxing that takes my mind away from the anthill of human life – whether it be landscape, the buzz of machinery, or the glow of a fire. Perhaps airplane taxiing is similar.

i very often fall asleep between pull back and take-off. i think it’s because, often, people quiet down, the hum of the motor, etc.

Are you talking about watching something go back and forth? (I’m guessing that’s what you mean by motion parallax.)

Well…that’s the same/similar path our eyes take when we are sleeping (esp. REM sleep).

It’s used to great effect with EMDR (see Phase IV for the most info about this). (This type of eye movement can make you also lose time.)

But I agree with @eponymoushipster: even being inside the plane, it is still relaxing to be taxied and/or be getting ready to take off.

LAX uses and ION system in their air conditioning to cause people to feel relaxed. It is not what you are seeing, so much as what you are breathing.

Airplanes are the elephants if the machine world. It’s wonderful watching these giant vehicles dance around each other. I find their takeoff curves overhead to be most relaxing. It’s also cool to drive along next to them as they land (I live near Newark).

@YARNLADY—is that a synonym for the G-23 Paxilon Hydrochlorate?

But seriously, what is this ION system you speak of? It sounds interesting, and I’d love to see some of the research behind it.

LAX, and many other airports use ionizers for their calming effect. I tried to find the article I read about it, but I could not.

I only find it relaxing when my planes are on time.

When my son was a baby, like many others, he had gas problems which kept him (and us) awake all night. I’m told I was the same.

I would try calming him down and putting him to sleep by holding him (in his infant seat) on the dryer as it was going.

If that didn’t work, and I was up to it, we’d go for a drive. That always put him to sleep.

Perhaps it’s the same with planes for us adults – maybe a stirring inside, a longing… the soporific effects of the engines’ sounds – sending us back to a more innocent time.

Hey, I just came across this excellent paragraph in Tom McCarthy’s Remainder and thought you might want to share it:

“I looked away, back up at the sky. A mile or so away, on the main runways, aeroplanes were taxying, turning and taking off, these huge steel crates all packed with people and their clutter moaning and tingling as they stretched their arms out, palms up, rising” (270).

@wildpotato That was nice.

Its relaxing that you’re not on those planes in a cramped-up seat with some fat guy bulging out of his onto you and ten thosand people are trying to get through that tiny aisle to their seats because they load the front seats before the back seats because the board of directors thought it would be funny to see people clamor about in a tiny airplane. Its relaxing that you’re in an acceptable-width and -comfort chair, probably without anyone sitting next to you, in a nicely air-conditioned and occasionally-cleaned building watching planes taxi around thinking about how uncomfortable people on those planes are.