[Jon Stratis]

Originally Posted by jvriezen

I agree that this touches on the worst issue of seating. Lunch time on Saturday is where you see the worst of this. The majority of a a team is out eating lunch (esp. if they are not in elims) and a few team members (or those returning early) try to hold all the seats.

Now here come the public that have never seen an FRC match before. They are confronted with what appears to be lots of empty seats with coats spread out, people telling them this is reserved, so if they stay, they end up in the cheap seats. There is no need for scouting on Saturday afternoon, and FIRST is about spreading the message and inspiring others so why not honor the public with the best seats?

What if FIRST made it a practice to reserve excellent seating for the general public starting shortly after Alliance selection? Some of the public will have team connections and may wish to sit near their teams, others just read the local paper and saw there was a free robotics competition and have no team affiliation. I'm not sure how many unaffiliated public folks typically show up at a regional, I'm sure that varies widely based on many factors. -- They may not need more than 200 seats or so, and teams wouldn't be pushed back very far.

I think this is a great idea! At champs this year, they reserved an entire section for volunteers right at half field on Einstein, which was a great move. Many of the volunteers spend their entire time in the pits working with teams, and the only matches they ever see are Einstein. Now we just need to do something similar for people with no team affiliation...