Re: [BB] Late Breaking News
 

Dean's speaking engagement in St. Louis this evening had actually been on the calendar for months.

His talk was inspirational, as we have come to expect. Uncharacteristically, he devoted much of his time (over an hour) to a history of his major product developments -- followed by a very quick history of FIRST. The audience was spellbound. Most of us were long-time St. Louis FIRST participants, sponsors, and volunteers.

On a personal note: I first visted Deka in January 1996. My first time hearing Dean speak about why FIRST is needed was at Kick-Off the next morning, at the Center of New Hampshire, just up the street from Deka. Tonight's talk in St. Louis brought up many memories of that first time for me -- after all these years Dean is still on message, and the message still resonates. :)

Re: [BB] Late Breaking News
 

Knowing that St.Louis was in the running I took the trip there a couple weeks ago and to make sure that the stadium was nice I had to go see the packers play the rams. :D


In all seriousness I really liked st.louis and their setup. The stadium was easy walking distance to numerous places to eat and hotels. There are many attractions in the city which can occupy time and it is slightly more centrally located then Atlanta.


http://map.mapnetwork.com/destination/stlouis/

Re: [BB] Late Breaking News
 

St. Louis sounds good to me, closer to drive then Atlanta. Glad to hear the walk to the floor will be shorter. I think we will all miss Atlanta, it is a great setup for the Championship, one that will be hard to match in St. Louis.

Re: [BB] Late Breaking News
 

Right up against AP exams now. Tough choice for kids... not to mention possibly irritated AP instructors. It's better than being during AP testing I suppose.

Re: [BB] Late Breaking News
 

I attended a convention at the America's Center this summer, and actually found it very difficult to get food quickly and easily. Downtown St. Louis is an absolute ghost town on the weekends, and I've heard countless people listing the food situation as their top reason for not wanting that event to return to St. Louis. I'm hoping (and expecting) that FIRST will be setting up vendors inside the venue, much like we've had in Atlanta.

Re: [BB] Late Breaking News
 

Nice, this just saved the teams/volunteers who fly a lot of hassle.

Why? The one thing I didn't like about Indy was that they have no real transit system. (No, I don't consider once-an-hour-buses as "real" transit). Atlanta was great. You land at the airport, take MARTA into downtown, and pretty much either just walk to your destination or take the train. All said and done, it costs a few bucks for the trip. The last time I was in Indy, a one way cab trip from the airport was $80! :ahh: Indy, you may have great people and great hospitality, but you're really lagging behind most other cities when it comes to real transit systems.

But after I saw St. Loius was selected, I immediately looked into their transit system and found they have a light rail line running from their airport to the downtown central business district, including a stop right at the America’s Center Convention Complex, where the Championships will be held, with plenty of hotels along the route and in the central business district. My wallet breathes a sigh of relief.

I've been to a lot of cities which only seem to cater to the 9-5, Monday through Friday business crowd. They built massive super highways from the downtown CBD to the wealthy suburbs, plowing through every neighborhood of character around the downtown, and destroying hopes of a "livable" downtown. It's sad to see urban areas neglected that much.

Getting back to your quote, where were you in downtown St Louis? Google seems to show quite an abundance of places to eat...

Re: [BB] Late Breaking News
 

Can't get much closer to the population centre of the USA. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mean_ce...tes_population

And we like St. Louis up here in Vancouver... the Blues were really nice to the Canucks last year.

Jason

Re: [BB] Late Breaking News
 

I don't know how i feel about STL, i'll definitely have to sleep on it. it's a good thing i got time.

This runs right up against finals for most college students (student mentors) and AP exams for students. This could be a tricky situation. otherwise, everything else looks legit reading the previous posts regarding transit and food. Im looking forward to a new city....

Re: [BB] Late Breaking News
 

Looks like I just might be testing out that transit system--I'll be spending close to a week in/around the Edward Jones Arena over Christmas break. (Bonus points to anyone who can figure out why, and almighty guru points to anyone who is going to the same event and can find me.)

Re: [BB] Late Breaking News
 

Wasnt there another thread that said unofficially, Championships was moving to St. Louis?
I swear I heard it somewhere........just cant remember.

I think its a great move. Time for a change of scenery finally.
The only question I have is why so late in April? More regionals? More weeks? Is build season moving back a week or two?
Personally, I like it better.
It makes attending a week 1 regional, not so cold!

Re: [BB] Late Breaking News
 

Maybe 7 weeks. Which makes some sense - if the district model expands a lot, can you have all the championships scheduled for just one weekend? Weeks 1-5 for districts, weeks 6-7 for championships. And for that matter, if you bag rather than ship, why can't the first events be the same week as bag/ship day?

Re: [BB] Late Breaking News
 

Not bad, this decision cut our teams potential driving time in half!!!!!

Re: [BB] Late Breaking News
 

I wonder if that had anything to do with the time of the year for you or me. I was there for a home NFL game and there was no lack of things open. Maybe things are different during the summer? Not sure about this but I hope the ST.Louis committee notifies vendors and they will provide similar service to what I saw 2 weeks ago.

Re: [BB] Late Breaking News
 

You know that Belle Fouche, S.D. is the geographical center of the US including Hawaii and Alaska.

Re: [BB] Late Breaking News
 

One of the really cool things about STL is that *most* things are free. The science center is really cool and the zoo is nice. So, teams potentially arriving Wednesday could find things to do for VERY cheap.

Though my heart is in Indy, STL should be great, too.

Now we just have to secure one of those every-year invitations to make sure we can go.