Our team had a very similar experience at the OKC regional and Dallas regional, the only difference is we were on the both sides of the spectrum. (sorry don't have experience at worlds but we encountered similar problems)
At the Dallas regional we pretty far away from all the major and elite teams so judging in our area seemed less common. So we developed the strategy that when a judge would walk by we would offer a button/keychain and from there we would talk about our program.
In OKC we happened to become a bit more popular in OKC and we were able to have more of an opportunity to talk to the judges. Now as someone being judged it is very nice to have that sort of opportunity to explain more. Now being stationed acrossed from 1710 was also very informative for since they ended up winning the chairman's award.
Now on spacing through the isles and pits, In dallas the isles could become very crowded and the judges would have to step into your pits when a robot was coming through. Which became very hard since you would have your pit team in pits working on the robot. So I agree with your idea about creating a separate room for this.
Well that just a little information about what happened to us. Sorry if I'm all over the place.
