pic: Houston Venue for Championship 2017

[Kevin Sevcik]

Originally Posted by Karthik

Sounds like a cool setup. I had far less problems with the pit fields in 2011 than most of my peers. Any idea on the logistics of moving robots and pits from the convention center to Minute Maid for Einstein? How far is this walk?

Google says 0.2mi from the nearest corner of GRB to the near side of Minute Maid. Convolutions to get down to the field would add some time and distance to this. IF* they do it this way, there's obviously going to be a fair bit of traffic to get field crew, etc. down there. They'd probably close down the roads, though I don't know that they'd provide covering as well. I would actually hope for a solution like rolling everything into a 15 foot UHaul and making a short drive over. If we're talking about pit fields, then it's not like you're dragging your entire pit onto the field for division elims again like this year, so it'd only be one giant move between Division Finals and Einstein for 16 teams.

Originally Posted by Cory

I didn't mind the pit fields that much in 2011, other than the bleachers being very uncomfortable. Hopefully FIRST springs for some with seatbacks this time around.

Originally Posted by Kevin Leonard

This. There is nothing worse than sitting the entire day in the stands scouting without seat backs.

Please, dear FIRST, give me seat backs.

I will certainly pass that request along. I can see that seating with seat backs is rentable, so I'm going to assume that it'd come down to cost vs. benefit thing. I'll try to explain the benefit as clearly as possible to Lucia.

*Caveat that the event is a year off and my information is from a single member of the board.