FIRST Chesapeake Districts

[GaryVoshol]

Originally Posted by Nathan Streeter

The teams in low-density areas should be able to attend one event fairly close to them (20-60min travel). They will then need to travel to get to their second event (45-120min).

Well, not quite. Houghton still is 3 hours from their nearest event at Escanaba. Then it's 7 hours (in good weather) to the next closest at Traverse City. (Michigan is a BIG state. It's farther from Detroit to Houghton than it is from Detroit to Baltimore, MD.)

[Nathan Streeter]

Originally Posted by GaryVoshol

Well, not quite. Houghton still is 3 hours from their nearest event at Escanaba. Then it's 7 hours (in good weather) to the next closest at Traverse City. (Michigan is a BIG state. It's farther from Detroit to Houghton than it is from Detroit to Baltimore, MD.)

Yeah, unfortunately Michigan and the PNW (being broader geographical areas) have a harder time keeping districts close to teams...

Even in New England (which collectively is about 75% as large by area as Michigan, and obviously lacks the isolated effect of the UP) there are tough situations for teams... The most remote team in Vermont (2370 from Rutland) currently has to drive 2hr, 18min and 2hr, 35min to get to their two closest districts. The most remote team in Maine (5122 from Old Town) has to drive 1hr, 53min and 3hr, 8min to their two closest districts.

That obviously doesn't even include teams that don't even exist in the most remote large population centers (let alone more remote areas). A team in Caribou, ME would have to drive 4.5hr and 6hr to get to two districts... Teams in Burlington, VT (the center of the most populous region in VT) would have to travel 3hr to get to their first two districts.

Unfortunately, FRC still hasn't reached far enough into the rural areas of the country... Note though, that this gets better with districts (not worse!) because expensive, large Regionals aren't even feasible in a lot of the regions we can legitimately discuss hosting a district event.

[Mr V]

The unfortunate fact of moving to the district system is that it is not financially fair to all teams. The most remote teams, particularly those who have traditionally only attended one Regional will most likely have their budget impacted negatively. It is even worse if they move on to the DCMP and the fact is that their chances of doing so are pretty good.

For teams that have traditionally attended two Regionals, particularly those from the team dense areas their costs can go down if they don't move on to DCMP or stay about the same if they do.

Keep in mind that District events are two day events and they usually have a load-in inspection day preceding the actual event days. Because nothing other than inspection and maybe the driver's meeting happens the first evening you can get away with less than the full team attending. That means that you can get away with only 1 night of hotels for part of the team in some cases and 2 for some of the team, so the hotel budget per event should go down purely based on the number of nights. Also note that in general the hotels are less expensive in the outlying areas than in the larger cities where Regionals have been traditionally held. In some cases the cost has been half of what I paid for a room at the Regional I used to travel to.

So yes the cost of transportation will almost certainly go up but between the fewer days and often less expensive hotels the cost of accommodations is not necessarily going to go up for attending two district events that require travel vs one travel regional. However the likelihood is that a large percentage of teams will be able to attend one District event w/o having to travel.

The other factor is that depending on the events in your area the net time away from school or work will stay the same or go down, 2 District events vs 1 Regional. The typical Regional was Thur-Sat meaning two missed days while District events are Fri-Sat or some times Sat-Sun meaning a total of 2 missed days or less.

Overall however the benefit of the District system is huge. Teams that have traditionally only been able to attend a single event now get to answer that question of "if we make these changes how will it perform" or they will finally be prompted to say "what can we do to improve our performance" when they never sat down and had that conversation before. I call it getting the full engineering experience. In real engineering there is usually some sort of ongoing testing and refining until the product/solution if finalized. With FRC the real world testing is the event, yes practice and testing at your shop is beneficial but the fact is none of us really, truly knows how the game will play out overall until we get to an event. This impact is usually greater on those teams from the outlying areas because they typically do not have access to a practice field or teams that they can do at least some form of scrimmage with.

The other thing to consider is that far more teams have a chance to move on to a higher level. I've seen many cases where a community, particularly those outlying areas, have really rallied behind a team when they come to the community and say "we've qualified for the next level". I've heard of teams raising most of the cost of the DCMP entry fee in one night and on very short notice in a very small school in a very small town. Hopefully that is something that will have a lasting impact on the community and the team's finances.

Tl/DR: Yes the financial impact can hit the teams from outlying areas harder but the teams from the outlying areas typically see a greater benefit from the district system.

[notmattlythgoe]

Originally Posted by Mr V

The unfortunate fact of moving to the district system is that it is not financially fair to all teams.

The regional system isn't fair either.

[Christopher149]

Originally Posted by GaryVoshol

Well, not quite. Houghton still is 3 hours from their nearest event at Escanaba. Then it's 7 hours (in good weather) to the next closest at Traverse City. (Michigan is a BIG state. It's farther from Detroit to Houghton than it is from Detroit to Baltimore, MD.)

And for Calumet (2586), add like another 20 minutes.

[bearbot]

Cant wait for Chesapeake District events going to miss the team that come from overseas.

[ehfeinberg]

I just thought I would post the slide in the presentation showing the driving distance to the district championship overlayed with the 2015 team map.

http://i.imgur.com/BteVQoa.jpg?1

Each ring is apparently 1 hour out from the district championship at UMD.

[Lij2015]

Originally Posted by ehfeinberg

I just thought I would post the slide in the presentation showing the driving distance to the district championship overlayed with the 2015 team map.

http://i.imgur.com/BteVQoa.jpg?1

Each ring is apparently 1 hour out from the district championship at UMD.

I will be very surprised if 388 will only have to drive 5 hours to UMD

[PayneTrain]

Originally Posted by Lij2015

I will be very surprised if 388 will only have to drive 5 hours to UMD

Yeah, it's probably close to 7 for Grundy.

Gotta wonder what's going to happen to a team like theirs where they're no better or worse off competing in NC instead of VA with respect to distance to events, and FTC has as close as FTC can get to a foothold in that part of the state.

:/

[Lil' Lavery]

Originally Posted by Lij2015

I will be very surprised if 388 will only have to drive 5 hours to UMD

They are clearly outside the 5 hour line by a significant margin.

[notmattlythgoe]

Ugh, the name and logo are so bad.

[wilsonmw04]

Originally Posted by notmattlythgoe

Ugh, the name and logo are so bad.

+1

[Hallry]

Originally Posted by notmattlythgoe

Ugh, the name and logo are so bad.

Something I've learned while competing in MAR: Districts are built by the volunteers that step up to the plate. Rather than just complaining about the name and logo, why not offer a better solution? Based on the information presentation, it sounded like they got the name after asking the area's teams to send in suggestions. So while that probably won't change, why not create a logo yourself to offer as a replacement? I'm eager to see what you come up with.

[notmattlythgoe]

Originally Posted by Hallry

Something I've learned while competing in MAR: Districts are built by the volunteers that step up to the plate. Rather than just complaining about the name and logo, why not offer a better solution? Based on the information presentation, it sounded like they got the name after asking the area's teams to send in suggestions. So while that probably won't change, why not create a logo yourself to offer as a replacement? I'm eager to see what you come up with.

Credit for the logos goes to Nate Laverdure

I will admit that I did not send in a suggestion for a name, which I regret. But sticking with the concept they seem to have been going for on the name something better would have been "FIRST on the Chesapeake." FIRST Chesapeake just sounds like a partial name, and not a name for a region.

[Nate Laverdure]

I want to see a logo that makes the District of Columbia look like the FIRST logo's blue diamond.