“I sometimes find the attack on rolling bags a bit annoying too.

Sites pertaining to one bag travel seem to be populated by folks with a tendency away from wheeled luggage. From what I can gather, the majority of those voicing opinions on these sites are men, in reasonably good health, who travel regularly, who travel without children, in mostly casual to semi-formal environments. Thus the majority seem to have different travel requirements than I do.

A quick glance around any US airport shows that the one bag, shoulder bag group is the minority, and wheeled bags are very popular. The reason for this popularity? Are we all gluttons for punishment, or just too stupid to read a blog or two. No. For many travelers, a wheeled bag is actually a better solution.

My favorite argument against the wheeled bag is the cobblestone argument, I would like to see someone post a pic of a stretch of cobblestones inside an airport, or in a hotel, or a cobblestone sidewalk in a business area in the US. If the majority of your travel involves walking in the street in Europe, then maybe a shoulder bag would be the better choice.

In the past 15 years, I can only recall lifting my bag to carry it across a 2 lane cobblestone road once. Is that what the fuss is about? Believe it or not, my bag wheels reasonably well along most cobblestone streets, only those with a very harsh surface are truly prohibitive.

It is certainly possible to travel well with one bag with a roller. Even the godfather of it all, over at onebag.com reports using an external cart when his bag is heavy.

If your bag is regularly heavy due to business or personal requirements, go with the roller. The downsides to a roller are that the inclusion of the rolling apparatus causes a decrease in the capacity of the bag and an increase in weight, and that the presence of the wheels externally can make it a bit more difficult and a bit more messy to handle when getting it into or out of luggage bins. The huge upside is that you don’t have to carry it everywhere, and in the majority of travel situations you can roll.

All of the other proposed downsides to rolling bags: damage to hotel stairs, noisy wheels, injuring other people in the airport, inability to roll up a ladder, or over cobblestones, are pretty weak arguments.

A well chosen rolling bag can weigh about 3-4lbs more than a comparable bag without wheels, and will hold about one pair of shoes less (actually about 1.5 shoes, but bringing half a shoe has yet to prove useful for me— maybe it would help me find more cobblestones…).

Consider that if your bag is heavy, the alternatives are: 1) a carried bag without an external cart (i.e. lug it around), 2) a carried bag with an external cart (the onebag.com solution), and 3) a rolling bag. I’m not going to suffer carrying a bag too heavy to handle, so my options are 2 and 3. Taking an external cart negates the weight and capacity advantages of a carried bag. So if your bag is rarely heavy, perhaps 2 is the option for you. If your bag is regularly heavy— perhaps due to medical supplies or a company issued laptop & projector setup, or other heavy burden (try stuffing a 8lb, 17 inch laptop and 4lb projector in your Air Boss), then the roller is the way to go.

My rule of thumb is that if the bag weighs much more than 10% of the bodyweight of the carrier, then the extra 3-4lbs for a well chosen roller will probably be worth the tradeoff.

Knowing that a rolling bag is my better option, I try to use the information on these sites to maximize my own solution— and do my best not to be annoyed by those who are not seeking a solution, but seeking rather to criticize others for using a wheeled bag.”