Hell yeah. Like the OP I have often wondered about this myself. It shouldn't be that hard to implement and Bethesda should do this in a patch/DLC or in the next TES. It would be a good feature wich will add even more depth to the game.

I wonder what roads the carriage is supposed to take. The "roads" don't often seem passable for a cart. I am still trying to find an actual road from Windhelm to Winterhold

I have often wondered why they don't just play a short video or even a still shot of your character on the cart during the loading screen. There is a lot of debate about whether carts should be attacked en route and how long the journey should be, etc. I have not really thought through all of that, so I won't comment one way or the other about those issues. Sure they could have done a lot more with the cart trip.

At a minimum, they should show you at least a picture of your character in the cart during the loading screen, instead of the regular loading screen. No excuse for not doing that at least.

Being able to interrupt/ skip the cinematic to get off at any time would be fine. The point of the carriage is so you dont have to worry about controlling, and immerse yourself as if you are actually taking a ride, and to enjoy the scenery.

Lol... we are so desperate for some sort of immersion when it comes to fast traveling. You would think it wouldve been common sense to add SOMETHING to immerse us.

It actually follows the Lore. In Daggerfall, if you were on a horse, you could be attacked, if you were in a Cart, you could not be attacked. it is an easy mechanism in the game to enable.

What I would not like about it is I would inevitably see something I wanted to explore while in the cart then have to jump out.

No guilty pleasure at all. The cart travel in some form or another has always been in rpgs. It has a logical reason and purpose in the game world, plus you have to have money to use it.

I can understand why the cart does not let you travel the entire journey and that`s because it would be very, very slow. However, I for one would take at least one trip that way and just relax... Might even bump into some incidents on the way.

Thinking about it, it must be possible to make as a mod as the cart mechanic seems to be all there.

Since I'm on PC I've only seen that thing in RDR, and yeah, I miss it. Maybe I'm on the phone, cooking or eating dinner - which makes it hard to control your own ride. Just sitting back, relaxing, and enjoying the view while enroute, would be awesome. Not something I'd do all the time obviously, but a neat feature.

Spawning? Seriously? While {not player in carriage} do {spawn enemies}? Maybe you're considered too hard to attack so they keep their distance, wouldn't be too hard to come up with an explanation for.

Oh well, maybe a mod then: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PhFKhuSXTdk

They serve the same purpose as the silt riders did in Morrowind. They could have had boats to take between Solitude, Dawnstar & Windhelm. I'm guessing the horse carriages go there anyhow so it wasn't needed.

I'm hoping a boat will take us from Windhelm to the Dunmer Island of Solstheim in a dlc. It is just east of Windhelm and is home to the native Nord Skaal tribe (with their amazing Nordic mail armor) and also has become a major Dunmer settlement since the fall of Morrowind.

So if you lived in the middle ages, traveling in a cart would ensure you wouldn't get waylaid? That's what I meant by unrealistic. Now if you could strap a machine gun on the cart and it would go fast...we got the makings of a great shooter there eh?

Unsure if anyone has said yet, but there's a Mod where you can "ride" a cart from a town to another town, witnessing everything.

However I forget it's name and I believe it's in BETA stages, also ofcourse this only applies if you on the PC.

It would be neat to see carriages traveling the roads as you are walking.

I'm not sure if someone mentioned this already but the truly mind boggling thing is that the very opening of the game has you in a cart on the way to your destination I mean it's already in the game. why is not preasent for all the other cart rides?

I'm in the camp that likes the *idea* of carriages, but is quite disappointed in how they were implemented. Obviously it was implemented for those of us who metagame and don't pinball around with FT, but its presentation is almost less immersive than simply FT'ing. I mean the typical presentation is showing me jump in the back (good), hearing a comment from the driver (which is often cut off mid-sentence), and thereafter it's no different than FT (same load screen and then, "Boom!", you're standing outside the city).

Even a few random snapshots that reflect the ingame geography of your route and a full comment or two from the driver would make the whole experience more fluid and immersive. And, of course, show me get off the cart at the destination.

THIS. OVER AND OVER AGAIN, THIS. ahaha, I love roleplaying, but not enough that I would walk from Vlindrell Hall (home) to Riften every time I need to drop off stuff. Although I would have liked to see an option of being able to watch the ride.

Someone above mentioned something about enemies during the ride, and the option to get out near enemies seems like a smart fix.

It's actually more than just a mod. It is official content that was cut from the game before release. A developer named Maturin released the work Bethesda had already done, as a mod. http://www.gamesas.com/topic/1321333-req-carriage-drives-you-places/page__view__findpost__p__20391449