Suggestions about champs?

[jjv]

Originally Posted by Dave Flowerday

One suggestion I have is in regards to unloading vehicles/trailers on Thursday. Everyone had a lot of stuff that needed to be brought into the pits, and having to wait in line for an hour for an elevator is a bit much.

You should have been there when we moved in...
We were first in line at the front door at 5am!! No troubles for us moving in, aside from FIRST deciding after our three were already on the elevator that carts were allowed...( they told us only what we coud carry, otherwise we would have been able to bring everything in.

[rachakate]

There seemed to be more than enough room on the floor to allow people to come down to the field level to cheer.

Also, on Newton, the cheering wasn't as exciting as it can be at a regional. The music was barely audible, and the camera didn't pan the crowd. Music and crowd shots always raise the intensity!

I think the pit crew passes is a great idea!

One day I stepped outside to answer a phone call, when I went to come back inside, the security guy at the door told me I couldn't come in there unless I was with FLL. I had to walk half way around the building outside, to get in a door to walk back half way around inside. Seems unnecessary.

I loved Atlanta. The weather was great. I wish I had taken better advantage of it.

[Billfred]

Originally Posted by Paul H

I agree with all that has been said, but how about this: More fields? There was plenty of space on the floor for at least 2 more fields. Teams only played 6 matches. This means that if they lost 3 of them, they were likely to be in the lower half of seeding. Or they could always keep the matches the same and allow more teams to come down. Either way, I think there should be more fields.

I think the one thing holding this back is frequencies. There are only enough to have four (maybe five, I can't remember) fields.

Personally, I saw (more like heard) a few folks on Archimedes bend/break/set aflame the noisemakers rule...if we're gonna enforce it, we've gotta enforce it.

Although I will agree with the idea to give out three non-driver badges to teams. Kinda like the team support badges in eliminations--12 more warm bodies around the field won't hurt a thing...as long as they don't block my view of the red goals, of course.

[tiffany34990]

it seems now there will always be a long walk from the pits to the stands cause of FIRST growing-- but yeah with more students allowed back with the bot if it is such a long walk is a good idea. I know our team doesn't have any radio-phone system to contact people back in the stands while on the way back that something is broken. Our driver and operators don't always know how to fix the bot--only two of them did which was good.

But with the food-- our team didn't use the coupons. I'm guessing that was for the packages and we didn't go to the team party the last one S.P.A.M. went to was the last one in Epcot so I can't compare. Our team though found that food court near the stadium, just a short walk and there was tons of fast food places to eat.

And reading y'alls posts-- i agree there should have been another practice field-- a half woud have been great-- i'm sure the hall of fame could have been placed somewhere else therefore another field could have been placed. the practice field was really helpful if u'r team could get time to use it.

[Phil 33]

First I gotta say, Atlanta was great. However.....

Many people are making comments about the venue, especially the long walk between the pits and the stands. This was a big problem in Houston last year that had to be fixed. What amazed me this year was how close the pits and stands actually were. But it seemed FIRST (or the Georgia Dome management and staff) went out of their way to make the trip even longer. Think about it. How many exits were blocked off? Remember the elevators we loaded stuff into the pits through on thursday morning? Why did they need to close them? That alone would have cut the trip in half. There were at least half a dozen exits that would've made the trip much shorter that were blocked off for no apparent reason. Even though they were blocked, many people were using them. They also blocked off the main doors to the Georgia dome and made everybody take the outside escalator down to the lower level to get in. They blocked off another entrance and said it was for FLL only. Again, why do this? Why not have several possible routes to take?

The route the robots and drive team took were the shortest by far. Here's a question, why limit their access for only drive team and robots? Remember in Houston last year, people and robots took the same route all the way until they reached the stadium and then separated. Why couldn't the short route have been open to all. Then before the entrance to the stadium floor have a gate for robots and drive team only, then route all the other people up to the main levels. This alone would have made the trip a ton shorter. Having several routes open would have controlled the crowds better. It's a lot of walking, and not every one of us has a Segway.

I am glad FIRST issued stickers which allowed a team's pit crew to get to the main floor during the finals. That was a necessity, and I'm glad FIRST recognized that. But even for the regular matches, allowing 3 extra people per team to enter won't hurt much, and it will save a ton of walking.

[Anne Shade]

Alright,

Several people have mentioned that they would like everyone to be able to walk through the same way as the robots. Unfortunately that will more than likely not be possible. The problem with that is that it really doesn't make it any shorter to get up to the stands. By going through the back way, you then have to walk up 5-6 flights of ramps to get to the stands. This area was also used as a volunteer staging area so in the end that would make the walk much longer and more tiring as there would not be any escalators.

I'm not saying that there is no solution to make the walk shorter, there is and it is already being looked at. What I am saying is that making the robot route available to all really would not help the situation any. That is why everyone was asked to walk around. I hope that clears things up a bit.

[AmyPrib]

Originally Posted by Phil 33

The route the robots and drive team took were the shortest by far. Here's a question, why limit their access for only drive team and robots? Remember in Houston last year, people and robots took the same route all the way until they reached the stadium and then separated. Why couldn't the short route have been open to all. Then before the entrance to the stadium floor have a gate for robots and drive team only, then route all the other people up to the main levels. This alone would have made the trip a ton shorter. Having several routes open would have controlled the crowds better. It's a lot of walking, and not every one of us has a Segway.

Maybe they can consider allowing only spectators with team shirts (i.e. the team members) to take the shorter path into the stands, splitting the path so robots don't have to fight for room. This can help the scouts and other team members get back and forth for matches/pit work. But I still stand by allowing 3 pit crew to go to the field.

If the Dome has a shorter path for all people, that would be great. I don't know the facility or what type of "way" up to the stands they have other than the skinny stairs up the wall inside the dome.
I noticed in the "end zones" there were no spectators, so maybe they could add those mobile stairs to a few of those openings up to the stands.

The only issue I could see with having the robot and spectator path be the same as the short robot walk is that it's not a hugely wide area. Robots and driveteams need to move quickly, and pass each other in opposite direction, and they should not be late or slowed down by thousands of people going to the stands. If they were to do that, they would need to enforce and split that path into clearly marked sides - one side for robots only - like they have elsewhere.
However, I could easily see that short path getting way more people congested than the escalators did. There would be less room for the people to be spread out, plus it might encourage people to go back and forth a lot more which adds to the congestion.

If they can solve the problem of getting pit crew and some other team members back and forth quicker, that would be a huge improvement, I think that's the biggest issue. While the extra spectators are important, I don't think we need to cramp the robot path with them, because I don't think they need to be back and forth as often.

I think this horse has been beaten dead, unless there are fresh ideas of how to traffic the people, but they don't need any more complaints about it. What are other constructive suggestions besides the long walk?

[Ryan Albright]

Originally Posted by Dave Flowerday

One suggestion I have is in regards to unloading vehicles/trailers on Thursday. Everyone had a lot of stuff that needed to be brought into the pits, and having to wait in line for an hour for an elevator is a bit much. Especially when you consider that this is a convention center, and that there has to be loading docks that are on the same level as the pits (I know there are, since they let us load up there at the end of the competition).

I had an $11 lunch from one of the vendors (BBQ pork sandwich) which was pretty awful. I know there's a lot of politics with regards to stadiums and their contracted vendors, but $11 for a lunch that's on par with a $4 meal from a fast food joint is really pretty bad. It's not that big of a deal, but it's the kind of thing that really irritates guests who just stop by to watch. Paying that much for 1 meal at a football game is one thing, but when the event goes on for 3 days and many people are there from early morning till mid evening it really adds up. I would think that it's a major turnoff to outsiders who may just happen to stop by with their kids after seeing it on the news or whatever.

{edit} I should have added this before, but... Overall, I thought the event was really great. The venue was very nice, the team party was fantastic, and our team had a great time. A lot of the problems identified from Houston seem to have been addressed (I'm not knocking Houston - it was a good event too, especially for the short notice. Being the first time away from Disney in many years had to have been a difficult job.) Hopefully the trend of year-over improvements will continue as everyone learns how best to run an event in a sports complex instead of a parking lot.

I agree getting everything unloaded and packed up was a pain thats why i made the suggestion in another thread. Why couldnt FIRST let like 3 people in on WEd just to set up there pits. Dont put the robot there leave the pits empty and give the three people liek a hour or two to set up there pits and bring in all there tools and then after everyone is gone then put the robots in each pit to be uncrated on thursday. Most teams were there on wed so they could do taht and not really run into any problem

[Matt Leese]

Originally Posted by Ryan_team710

I agree getting everything unloaded and packed up was a pain thats why i made the suggestion in another thread. Why couldnt FIRST let like 3 people in on WEd just to set up there pits. Dont put the robot there leave the pits empty and give the three people liek a hour or two to set up there pits and bring in all there tools and then after everyone is gone then put the robots in each pit to be uncrated on thursday. Most teams were there on wed so they could do taht and not really run into any problem

Simply because that would require everyone to arrive earlier and have the event staff there a day earlier. FIRST does enough work running a three day event; I highly doubt they'd like to extend it to four.

Matt

[Ryan Albright]

Originally Posted by Matt Leese

Simply because that would require everyone to arrive earlier and have the event staff there a day earlier. FIRST does enough work running a three day event; I highly doubt they'd like to extend it to four.

Matt

isnt first staff already there setting up fields and testing equipement and stuff it doesnt require that many people to be htere

[Dave Flowerday]

Originally Posted by Ryan_team710

isnt first staff already there setting up fields and testing equipement and stuff it doesnt require that many people to be htere

Yes, they're there working, and one of the things I expect they're doing is setting up the pits. I haven't been to a championship while they're setting up, but I know at the regionals it's literally a "just in time" thing - people are there until late Wednesday setting it up because usually the truck doesn't get there before that and the facility isn't available anyway. I think the allowing of 3 people to go in early is a good compromise for now.