FIRST Championship Housing Available

[MrJohnston]

Silly me. I thought I could attempt to book rooms two weeks before we could possibly qualify and get something... Experient has put me on a "wait list" with no promises... I've contacted about 20 hotels and found nothing. Aargh.

[Rick]

If you do not secure hotel rooms when they first are available, you will not be able to walk to the dome.

The travel situation in St. Louis is a great lesson in opportunity cost for students. You might lose a $500 deposit on a $250pp bus, but if you don't secure the bus with the deposit, you could be looking at $750pp flights.

<rant>St. Louis hotels and airport cannot handle a 600 FRC team championship never mind an FTC and FLL championship on top of it.

I cringe at the thought of STL on Sunday leaving champs.

I really hope we have a new city for 2018 with a proper airport.</rant>

[BrendanB]

Originally Posted by Ricksta

If you do not secure hotel rooms when they first are available, you will not be able to walk to the dome.

The travel situation in St. Louis is a great lesson in opportunity cost for students. You might lose a $500 deposit on a $250pp bus, but if you don't secure the bus with the deposit, you could be looking at $750pp flights.

<rant>St. Louis hotels and airport cannot handle a 600 FRC team championship never mind an FTC and FLL championship on top of it.

I cringe at the thought of STL on Sunday leaving champs.

I really hope we have a new city for 2018 with a proper airport.</rant>

There are so many small logistics I don't even want to think about creating more mess.

Don't even consider getting to team load in after 2pm on Wednesday its just going to be a giant mess of buses.

[PayneTrain]

Originally Posted by BrendanB

There are so many small logistics I don't even want to think about creating more mess.

Don't even consider getting to team load in after 2pm on Wednesday its just going to be a giant mess of buses.

Oh team load-in was such a special disaster last year with 400 teams, y'all have fun with the extra 200.

[jds2001]

Originally Posted by PayneTrain

Oh team load-in was such a special disaster last year with 400 teams, y'all have fun with the extra 200.

Well, from some other threads it seems as though there may have been more than the allotment of reps per team at least for some teams. Perhaps better enforcement of that limit will make things (at least a little) better?

[BrendanB]

Originally Posted by jds2001

Well, from some other threads it seems as though there may have been more than the allotment of reps per team at least for some teams. Perhaps better enforcement of that limit will make things (at least a little) better?

What makes it tough is that a few hours later the pits open entirely so the venue is decently full with team members waiting outside until the pits open completely. Plus for teams who travel via bus even it doesn't make a difference if they send 5 people or 55 the giant charter bus is still taking the to the venue to unload their equipment plus traffic starts setting in.

Its not a perfect system its just a part of the reality that around the dome becomes even more gridlocked.

[Bgreen1591]

Since we all are having trouble booking, and from what I have read this goes all the way back to Bag day. Teams only see 20mile away hotels with single beds. My question is, who has all these rooms blocked?

[IndySam]

With the FLL and FTC pits not being there I hope they will open more of the doors so load in can take place more quickly.

[Garciadealba]

Hi, first time posting. I went in to the housing online system and selected 8 options by the airport and all options had a 1 bed rooms, on the bottom I wrote on the comments that I needed 2 bed rooms. I got response that we were set up at the Marriot and this was not an option from all the hotels that I selected, in fact, the Marriot was not within all the possible options to chose from. I think that if you write in the coments your needs, experient will look for them.

[Wetzel]

I booked outside Experient when I realized what a mess it was, but continued the process anyways. I booked a block in a Hilton property that is closer than Experient got around to giving us, and for less. Will try with Experient more to get a hotel walking distance, but am not hopeful.

[KelliV]

I see a lot of Experient critiques here and just wanted to chime in that I book through them for NAB Show in Vegas and have had zero issues. Just give them some time to figure out FIRST. I have high hopes that in the future they will be great.

[Libby K]

Originally Posted by MrJohnston

Silly me. I thought I could attempt to book rooms two weeks before we could possibly qualify and get something... Experient has put me on a "wait list" with no promises... I've contacted about 20 hotels and found nothing. Aargh.

You're lucky - we haven't heard back from Experient at all...

We tried to follow the 'rules' and not reserve until we were sure we were going.

I foresee a lot of teams who booked before qualifying, and ended up not qualifying, dropping their rooms and creating more availability. Lucky break for the Week 6 & 7 qualifying teams who'll get blocks at great hotels.

Not so much for those who waited to know if they were actually going before putting themselves in.

[MrJohnston]

Originally Posted by Libby K

You're lucky - we haven't heard back from Experient at all...

We tried to follow the 'rules' and not reserve until we were sure we were going.

I foresee a lot of teams who booked before qualifying, and ended up not qualifying, dropping their rooms and creating more availability. Lucky break for the Week 6 & 7 qualifying teams who'll get blocks at great hotels.

Not so much for those who waited to know if they were actually going before putting themselves in.

I called Experient so that I could "hear back" from them.... Follow the "rules"? If there were "rules," why did Experient inform me that I needed to call on January 5 (before anybody had even built a robot - except Ri3D) if I wanted to have rooms for Champs?

I have got to think that there is a better way to do this? Giving teams some sort of "code" to use when they qualify that would be particular to that one team and is required for making reservations might help? Or, don't open up the registration process at all until a much later date - in late March, perhaps? I have got to think that there is a lot of "extra labor" involved in the current system as teams that end up not going, cancel. When rooms become available teams jump from one reservation to a "better one." Etc.

I do know this: Unless the system changes, I'm going to be making my reservation very early next year...

[Libby K]

Originally Posted by MrJohnston

I called Experient so that I could "hear back" from them.... Follow the "rules"? If there were "rules," why did Experient inform me that I needed to call on January 5 (before anybody had even built a robot - except Ri3D) if I wanted to have rooms for Champs?

I have got to think that there is a better way to do this? Giving teams some sort of "code" to use when they qualify that would be particular to that one team and is required for making reservations might help? Or, don't open up the registration process at all until a much later date - in late March, perhaps? I have got to think that there is a lot of "extra labor" involved in the current system as teams that end up not going, cancel. When rooms become available teams jump from one reservation to a "better one." Etc.

I do know this: Unless the system changes, I'm going to be making my reservation very early next year...

Sorry - wording choice was poor on my part. There were, obviously, no rules. We were just trying to not to take spots away from teams that would actually qualify/be able to commit earlier than we possibly could, instead of blocking them out of spaces they could use. That's all I meant. (Follow the way it should be done, I suppose.)

I agree - there's a lot missing from the current system. Either open it only to teams who qualify during a certain date range, use a 'code' as you mentioned... there are quite a few solutions that would be better than this.

Edit:: I find it interesting they were receptive to your call. We've called a few times and they essentially shut us down, saying "Everything has to be done online, I can't help you over the phone." Guess we got the wrong person on the wrong day...

[Chi Meson]

I have to say that I'm rather "OK" with the results. I have had some of the issues mentioned by previous posters, but ultimatlely I prefer this system far beyond the horrifically inaccessable Steele Meeting folk that left me high and dry on three occasions.

They have returned my emails quickly and answered my question completely.

I am less impressed with the more recently revealed "travel resource program". I think that there's a guy on the other side who is essentially doing the same thing I can do with my own computer.

In short, we have decent hotel rooms, but I wonder how we'll get there?