I think your colleague probably just doesn't like to travel and maybe got dragged along by family? Or maybe he's just a negative person in general and always see the glass half empty
I was just talking to my sister today about flying budget airlines from our local airport. She said she had a very bad experience 20 years ago, so now she'd rather drive 3 hours to London, pay for parking and more expensive major airline tickets, instead of a 20 journey to our local airport and fly budget airline. Me and my other sister felt that budget airlines aren't great, but they've come a long way since 20 years, and it's mainly short haul anyway. It's much better to save the hassle and waste so much time to get to the airport. I wonder if she'll change her mind...
You're right on the negative person aspect, no doubt; a good guy, someone I like and wish I could help out, but someone I find very draining at the same time.
I've travelled on some of the best airlines, up the front, and in other parts of the plane too, (down the back), and on some terrible planes, or other modes of transport as well, and while some could be seen as better than others I see it all as experience and another layer of the trip. I actually don't see a lot of point in paying high prices for travel as it takes away from monies better spent in other ways but there's times I will pay I guess, depends on where and how long the flight is.
I tend to agree with your (and other sister's) ethos on the matter and think it's probably quite smart.