Any Atlanta First Time Traveler Tips you want to Share?

Competition Championship Event
#34

Haha. You should of saw the “walk” from the pits to the stands in 2004. That was ridiculous. Thankfully, the “walk” has been about the same for robot and the stands over the last couple years. You’ll probably start the day running back and forth to the stands, but by the afternoon, that big screen in the pits is much more tempting to watch your match on. The production people do a decent job of covering the matches, so you might want to bring a “SOAP” box to hook into the feed.

You can uncrate your robot on Thursday morning (if no one else said this yet). The Wednesday night, is just something to ease the tension of the crazy morning on Thursday. Don’t expect to work on your robot if you come on Wednesday. Thursday is crazy … to say the least. Drayage lost our tool crate in 2005 and took several hours to find it. Kudos to the surrounding teams that let us use their stuff to unpack our robot crate (1398 … go robo raiders!)

Avoid the “event staff” people in the yellow jackets when needing FIRST related information. I’ve been lead completely in the wrong direction many times by them. They will not search you going into the pits, but they will search you going into the dome. Expect to pay $10 for a “meal” there. Expect to pay $4~6 for a drink in the dome, but the people that do the food … have a great sense of humor and if you give them buttons or something, they will usually wear them.

Ride the MARTA (like everyone else said), but plan ahead. Especially if you’re going to ride it at rush hours. If you’re flying in, stop by one of the MARTA counters in the airport and get a roll of tokens, much easier than camping out on the vending machines waiting for 30 students to get their tokens.

Watch out for the homeless people. They will sing and dance for you in hopes of money, and they will be glad to give you directions, but at night … some will also be glad to pickpocket you. There is a Hard Rock Cafe in Downtown, about 5 blocks from the dome. If you plan on eating there, plan on waiting for up to 2 hours.

Practice fields - IMO are a joke. There’s one for each division, and it’s been a full size field in the past. In previous years, they actually ran simulated matches … I don’t think they did this last year (but I wasn’t in the pits much, so I’m not sure)

Avoid the machine shop unless needed. This might be hard, since in the past there have been tons of teams with drill presses, bandsaws, lathes and mills in their pits. In 2005, it took our team 3 hours to get a hardened steel shaft cut (just cut; not even machined) … I walked over to check on the part, and the lady was holding it in her hand wondering what it was, because they lost the paper with the request on it.

Tell everyone back home … http://robotics.nasa.gov … and let them know what field you’re on. NASA does a lovely job on the webcast. It’s also on the NASA channel, but that goes from field to field throughout the day, so you might not even see your team on there. No internet connection in the pits or dome, but almost every hotel will have wifi (or wired). There are a couple of coffee shops/gift shops in the GWCC that have internet access at a price.

Cell phone reception isn’t the best depending on what part of the dome or pits you’re in. Remember, cell phones don’t like concrete. The dome and GWCC have plenty of both.

Most of all, have fun. Atlanta is a treat. You’ll be running around crazy the whole time … so be prepared :cool: Come find me and say hi … not sure if my team will be there or not (that will be determined this weekend). Either way … I will be. Wouldn’t miss it for the world.

#35

I have a transportation question. We have a 25 person group. We were told that getting from the airport to the hotel (Holiday Inn Downtown) would cost $17 pp each way! We were also told that you could take public transportation for about $1.75 pp. I can see what the obvious choice is but how often does it run (we’re getting in at about 10:30 Wed. night). And, is that a bus or MARTA, and how close would it bring us to the hotel? Any info would be helpful.

#36

I haven’t read the entire thread so I don’t know if people have said what I’m going to say but here we go

Things to keep in mind at Atlanta

The distance between the pits and the field is a big gap! They are actually in different buildings, the World Congress Center holds the pits and the Georgia Dome is the field. They are right next to each other.

If your team doesn’t have a scouting group then make one immediately! Between going to check out teams in the pit to watching matches to learn about different teams, having a scouting team is going to be essential if you want to succeed at the Championships.

Be unique! Do something special that seperates you from the other teams. Have something memorable about your team that makes people remember you. You’re looking to make a good impression and make a name for yourself seeing as how your new.

Put your teammates to work! If you’ve got people on your team doing nothing get them working. There are plenty of things that your teammates could be doing to help make the event a success, be productive.

Last but not least, have fun! The Championship Event is alot of fun and try your best to enjoy it. Its a chance for you to enjoy the culmination of all your hard work. I guarantee that all teams new to it will have a great time, it really is a special moment

Well that’s all I’ve got, hope that this will help alot of teams that are new to the experience.:slight_smile:

#37

The $1.75 figure is MARTA. Holiday Inn’s website says the hotel is 0.3 miles from the Peachtree Center station. The after 9:00 PM schedule is here. With a group of 25, you’re probably not going to be hassled too much on the train, even late at night. However, if you have a lot of luggage and tools and things, you may want to seriously consider other transport.

#38

That’s on a MARTA train. The Holiday Inn is ~4 blocks from the Peachtree MARTA station (that’s a rough guess, if I remmeber correctly). If you call the hotel, they will have an exact distance. The CNN center station might be closer, but you would have to change trains at Five Points. If you got off at Peachtree, you wouldn’t have to worry about that. The ride from the Airport to downtown is about 25 minutes or so. Kind of cool during the day, because you get to see a lot of the city (the MARTA is above ground for the most part).

You can see the MARTA map here:

http://www.itsmarta.com/getthere/schedules/index-rail.

Hours of operation are listed here:

http://www.itsmarta.com/howto/hours.htm - Looks like they run till 1:30am … so you should be fine. It also has the times about how often the trains run.

Hope this helps :slight_smile:

edit Darn … Jeff beat me to it.

#39
  • You CANNOT do everything. Accept that fact.
  • Make sure to go to the team party. Even if you don’t eat a thing, go, you’ll see the real FIRST there.
  • Omni food court = god
    *]Talk to teams you normally can’t/wouldn’t.
#40

Those tips can help us big because this is 1856’s second year in FRC but all the members of the team are rookies.

#41

Here’s a map I got from 2 years ago (PDF format). Back then I didn’t have to go to the Pits; this year I probably will. I should invest in some good walking sneakers!

Regarding the (ahem) “local people.” We had just flown in and dumped the luggage, and was walking around downtown to see how far we were from the dome. A nicely dressed man with a clipboard hooked up with us and asked us some questions and generally trying to be our “tour guide”. It took a couple of minutes to realize he was just a homeless person trying to get some of our money. The clipboard was a good touch.

We wanted to go to the World of Coke. He did direct us there, but by way of Five Points, the center of the subway system and also of every homeless person in Atlanta.

I am not too sorry WOC is closed. $8 to watch bottles of coke pretending to be filled was $8 too much. Tasting the different flavors of coke was interesting, especially offering that vile bitter version to our unsuspecting kids. :confused: :eek: :ahh:

#42

So, where did the PDF go?

Lets try again. Ahhh… the wonders of the 21st century!

#43

Here is a nice photo of the GA Dome during last years Championship’s finals. Click on the picture several times to see an enlarged view. Nice job Ed Clark & Tim Arnold.
Dave

#44

That reminds me: You see where the phot is taken high above? Don’t go up to the 2nd or 3rd level. Security will bust you in a heartbeat.
At the regionals security is abit more relaxed but at the championship the guys in the yellow coats seem to be stressed by all the loud hyper kids running around and don’t have much patience for anything outwardly foolish (if these are the same guys they use for the NFL games I would highly recommend to avoid annoying them if they’re like the yellow coats at Bills games. They must be encouraged to mangle the unruly).
Just stay out of the areas that are blocked off. They’ll open the 2nd level for the finals but til them stay out.

#45

How do the awards work? Does your whole team go an accept the award like a normal regional? Seems like a major traffic jam to run from the stands to the floor if it was your whole team.

#46

In the past, each team designates two people to go down and accept the award. I think they had a special area for those people to sit in, but I’m not real sure on that. If your team is going to sit up on the second level make sure the two people are sitting down on the first level somewhere.

#47

The main exception to the 2 rep setup is for the Chairman’s award, because the whole team comes down to get that.

It is very nice that they’ve gone to combining the awards and finals. While a little weird going back and forth, it does get rid of the “wait time” between matches and awards that exists at the regional level. It also provides robot cool-down time.

#48

Question. Do they still have an area set up near the arena so the teams that are playing can watch their robots compete?
In years past you could sit near the play area and watch your robots, but you would have to leave after they were done.

#49

No… you just sit in the stands like everyone else. Since the field is below where the seats are, there is no need for this like there was in the parking lot of Epcot. All seats have a good view of the field.

AB

#50

No. Your team will have to sit in the stands. The last 2 years they gave each team a “Team Media Pass” which enables a single team member to enter the play area with the team and stand in front of the field (where the judges would sit, on the opposite side of the scoring/field table) with a camera to record the match.

They have been doing the “Team Viewing Area” at a lot of regionals this year, so they might do something in Atlanta, but I would doubt it; there isn’t much open space on the dome floor.

#51

what is the finale and why is it 45.00 dollars?

#52

Mentioned in previous post but:
“This just in” from “Budget Travel” magazine-
World of Coca-Cola will close April 7 and reopen May 24 in a new building next to the Aquarium.

#53

The “Finale” (aka Team Party) is held on Satuday evening after the competition ends.

Since the move to Atlanta, the $45 fee gets you an entrance bracelet to the party at Centenial Olympic Park, food, & drink. The bracelet also allows you to take part in various activites like carnival games, a batting cage, inflatable obstacle course, and other “picnic” style inflatable activities. They also have a stage, where they usually have 3 or 4 acts perform. My favorites are the hypnotist and of course the finale fireworks display.