Location Suggestion for 2010 Championship

[Stu Bloom]

Originally Posted by Dan2081

2 Words...
Peoria, Illinois

WOW Dan ... have you ever been to the Championships? I know Peoria pretty well and there's no way Peoria could handle it .

But seriously ... Indianapolis almost had it when the last contract was renewed with Atlanta. I say come back and look at Indy again - now that the new stadium and more new hotels are open.

[Racer26]

I'm with Karthik, the SkyDome (shoot me if I ever call it the Rogers Centre) and Metro Toronto Convention Center combo COULD definitely support the Championships. The square footage is there. As for you southerners complaining about the weather? Historically speaking, by late April winter is well over, and we see temperatures in around the 10-15 C mark. (In American, thats 50 to 60 degrees)

[Travis Hoffman]

People in Atlanta seeking to build a new Falcons stadium on the grounds of the closed Doraville GM facility [happy thoughts] in suburban (i.e. not downtown) Atlanta:

http://news.moneycentral.msn.com/cat...PINIONS&isub=2

I wonder what would happen to the Georgia Dome if this were to occur - obviously, it would lose its most notable tenant - I do not know how "booked" the Dome is outside of Falcons home games.

If they blew up the Georgia Dome (Why? It's not that old, is it? Rich getting richer....), I wonder how that would affect Atlanta's chances at retaining the Championship Event long term....

[Steven Sigley]

Originally Posted by Travis Hoffman

People in Atlanta seeking to build a new Falcons stadium on the grounds of the closed Doraville GM facility [happy thoughts] in suburban (i.e. not downtown) Atlanta:

http://news.moneycentral.msn.com/cat...PINIONS&isub=2

I wonder what would happen to the Georgia Dome if this were to occur - obviously, it would lose its most notable tenant - I do not know how "booked" the Dome is outside of Falcons home games.

If they blew up the Georgia Dome (Why? It's not that old, is it? Rich getting richer....), I wonder how that would affect Atlanta's chances at retaining the Championship Event long term....

In the article you provided it says "The Falcons are bound by a lease to play in the Georgia Dome in downtown Atlanta through 2020, but team owner Arthur Blank said in 2006 he wanted to start negotiating a new downtown Atlanta stadium."

We'd be good for at least 10 more years before we'd even have to worry about it.

[Travis Hoffman]

Originally Posted by Steven Sigley

In the article you provided it says "The Falcons are bound by a lease to play in the Georgia Dome in downtown Atlanta through 2020, but team owner Arthur Blank said in 2006 he wanted to start negotiating a new downtown Atlanta stadium."

We'd be good for at least 10 more years before we'd even have to worry about it.

Ask Seattle Supersonics fans what they think about the security of leases. But anyway:

This mentions the possibility of the lease expiring in 2015:

http://www.ajc.com/living/content/me...doraville.html

Seems there are two competing interests - the suburban Doraville stadium supporters and the GWCC people wanting to build a new stadium downtown. Which option Falcons owner Arthur Blank officially backs remains to be seen.

This may be a non-issue if the city of Atlanta can afford to retain the Georgia Dome even with the absence of the Falcons as a tenant, but it's something to keep an eye on, anyway.

[Tetraman]

This may be a little over the top....but wouldn't it be cool if we could build our own FIRST Robotics Grand Stadium? It could hold all the FIRST robotics championship competitions and conventions, it would be the home of the hall of fame and other history making halls. It could also be a special summer camp for FIRST students. I would have it's own hotels for all teams and other sorts of buildings and centers...and don't forget three bronze statues of Woody, Dean and Dave in the courtyard.

A guy can dream....I'll put that on the list of things I'll do before I die...build that building.

[Enigma's puzzle]

If i became incredibly rich one day i would make a convention center arena designed for that. How could the rest of the world ignore FIRST if that happened.

Maybe the New Edward Jones Dome in St. Louis, adjacent america's center i like that idea i don't know about hotels though, BUT it doesn't get any closer to the center of the country

[cbudrecki]

that's funny, I've had the same ideas. I've pretty much all but drawn out blueprints for the ultimate FIRST stadium! (this sounds like the start of a new thread...)

[suj]

the rogers center or ontario science centers in toronto would be nice oh wait how about direct energy center it's huge

[PinionTwister]

Originally Posted by Tetraman

This may be a little over the top....but wouldn't it be cool if we could build our own FIRST Robotics Grand Stadium? It could hold all the FIRST robotics championship competitions and conventions, it would be the home of the hall of fame and other history making halls. It could also be a special summer camp for FIRST students. I would have it's own hotels for all teams and other sorts of buildings and centers...and don't forget three bronze statues of Woody, Dean and Dave in the courtyard.

A guy can dream....I'll put that on the list of things I'll do before I die...build that building.

AMEN!!! If would be great to have our own stadium - purpose built for Robotics competition. I will hope for my lifetime as well.

[DevDebie2200]

I second the idea at Skydome/Rogers Center in Toronto, Ontario

[dodar]

Id say we go back to Disney for the Championships

[Rick TYler]

The championships are scheduled in Atlanta for 2010, according to the GWCC website: http://www.gwcc.com/calendar/gwcc.html.

Building a new stadium is really, really, hugely expensive. Even with FIRST's steadily-increasing cash horde, there's no way they will be able to afford the multiple-hundreds of millions it would cost. Just as a point of comparison, the estimated cost of building the Seattle Sonics a new facility in Renton (a city to the southeast of Seattle) was $400 million. The new owner snuck the team out of town at least in part because that wasn't going to be good enough. It simply isn't going to happen, and even if the money is available I think it would NOT be furthering the goals of FIRST to spend the money this way. I'd rather fund 500,000 Vex or 25,000 VRC teams in 25,000 schools in North America than squander $400 million on a facility that is easily duplicated each year with a comparatively modest rental fee.

[AmyPrib]

For whoever commented that someone should do an analysis of the "centralized" location for teams to attend (like Indy) - it was already done once a few years ago and showed that more teams could reasonably drive to Indy than Atlanta - thus typically saving costs..

So.... I did the analysis again...

This is only accounting for FRC teams.
Data is based on the 340 teams that attended Championships in 2008. Results are similar to what I found back in 2005.

Of those 340 teams, 64 were omitted from much of this because they would have to fly anyways (includes "mandatory fliers" or if 20+hrs of driving).

Note - 54 "Mandatory Fliers" included HI, WA, CA, OR, WA, PR, Brazil, Israel, Mexico. That leaves 10 teams that are 20+hrs driving.

Of the remaining 276 teams:
13 teams are under 3hrs of driving to Atlanta 4.7%
17 teams are under 3hrs of driving to Indy 6.2%

17 teams are under 5hrs of driving to Atlanta 6.2%
73 teams are under 5hrs of driving to Indy 26.4%

74 teams are under 10hrs of driving to Atlanta 26.8%
148 teams are under 10hrs of driving to Indy 53.6%

227 teams are under 15hrs of driving to Atlanta 82.2%
237 teams are under 15hrs of driving to Indy 85.8%

Further - of the 340 teams total: (but not including 54 mandatory fliers)
221 are closer to Indy than Atlanta.
106 teams would shave 5+hrs off their driving if going to Indy instead
33 teams would shave 8+hrs off their driving if going to Indy instead


This is just data. Note it does not take into account who actually flies or drives each year - simply what the realistic potential would be. Also - it's a lot of data, so give or take a few for human error, but it's correct as best I can see.

[Burmeister #279]

I personally love atlanta, the stadium, the park, et al, but to be honest, my parents have not* been able to attend because of other family things, nor can my grandparents because of the distance [12-15 hours of driving] from here [Toledo] to Atlanta. Indy on the other hand, what 5 hours easy? our ENTIRE team plus parents etc. could go simply because its close enough that if there's an emergency in between it wouldn't be a whole day before they got back.

my other 2 cents.

*this year was the first but my grandpa has prostate cancer and can't drive more than 5 hours.