Detroit vs St Louis

Competition Championship Event
#13

How about versus Houston?

We’ve attended all three cities, now (but not Atlanta or earlier).

We stayed in Greektown this year. The hotel was expensive but it was still cheaper for us than having to get ground transportation every day after flying in. The People Mover was right there. Getting to/from Cobo was a breeze. We tried a lot of restaurants that were reasonably priced and had great food. Parking the trailer that drove up was a disaster and took hours to find a parking spot for it. After being on Carver in Houston last year (farthest field from the pits) having the pits adjacent to the field on Carson in Detroit was amazing. Food was easier to come by over the other two venues without the lines being as long. I did see one guy get dragged off the DPM by police, and another mentor saw a drug bust with a ton of police.

Houston: Discovery Green = great for meeting and eating. The convention center configuration = terrible with the pits so far away from the fields. Ford Field & EJ Dome >> Minute Maid Park for viewing experience. There were enough rooms that we could stay downtown both times so I can’t really comment on traffic although I know it can be a bigger issue than in the other two cities. Having NASA and the beach as pre- or post- event activities is a huge plus.

St. Louis: I remember having tons of trouble finding food near the venue that didn’t have long lines or wasn’t $15 for a cheese sandwich at the venue. But we really didn’t have a good plan for travel and didn’t know what we were doing so I am not sure I can judge as well. We had several people get sick after eating the EJ Dome food. City Museum is awesome and we went there all three years we were in St. Louis. Food on The Hill is great if you can get there. Long walk from pits to queue.

Out of all the activity nights we’ve had, the favorite of the kids (aside from City Museum) was the year that FIRST had the big inside carnival at Americas Center after closing ceremonies. For some reason they liked the indoor party at Ford Field this year better than the outdoor party at Discovery Green last year even though they had basically the exact same activities. Maybe it was because Ford Field was a little more crowded and had more energy than being outside.

They’ve all been good in different ways, and have all had some issues. It’s hard to put together a massive event and have it go off without a hitch. The Minute Maid experience the first year in Houston was the worst time we had just due to the length of the program and the crazy security line.

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#14

The thing I missed most from St. Louis are corn dogs and funnel cake. I couldn’t find either in the Cobo.

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#15

Our team got to go to Detroit this year and I thought it was great! Its really quick and easy to get back and forth between the field and the pits and the Einstein experience is way better than Houston (the worst seats in Detroit are better than the best seats in Houston!). It did seem like the amount of seats in the divisions were just barely enough though. The area in Detroit seemed safer than St. Louis and a lot safer than Houston from my minimal experience.

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#16

Honestly I liked St. Louis more because sure worlds is about the competition but a big part of worlds at least for me is the spectacle of the event, St. Louis did that very well being in a stadium with the massive scale of everything but I think the way detroit is better is because you don’t have to go far to pit where at St. louis you had to walk quite a ways and the innovation fair is right near the event were at st. louis it was in an entire different building but going back to the spectacle part of the event detroit does not provide except for ford field. I was never able to experience einstein is St. louis because I got super sick that day and had to go back to the hotel so I was not able to see that and that is why I did not comment on it.

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#17

The thing I missed most from St. Louis are corn dogs and funnel cake. I couldn’t find either in the Cobo.

But Detroit has yummy robot-made donuts. :doughnut:

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#18

There were funnel cakes in one of the tents outside of Cobo on Thursday.

#19

Anyone find corndogs?

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#20

Service - St Louis beats Detroit hands down. It seems anywhere beats Detroit hands down in this category. Seriously, why is the service in Detroit and surrounding areas so bad? On top of that, the servers seemed to be on edge or angry at most places. And why the ungodly wait times for food and drinks?

Is this normal for all of Michigan?

#21

And the sample size for your all-inclusive sweeping statement for an entire region was…???

Sorry if you had a bad experience. But this post is extremely troll-like.

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#22

Like 15 restaurants over 2 years. Relatively small but not insignificant sample.

#23

Not really, what kind of restaurants do you go to? Although the roads getting to anywhere in Michigan are awful.

#24

From Southgate to Southfield. Many restaurants in the mix - some chain, some bars, some mom and pop, some hotel restaurants.

Not trying to be troll-like, but the service in the places I visited were some of the worst I have ever experienced.

#25

I mean, I live in Michigan and have been to a ton of restaurants and service is normally pretty good. (Detroit some areas may not be)

#26

To put a positive spin on service and eating in and around Detroit, I certainly hope you qualify for Worlds again next year and give it another try.

Detroit has a VERY vibrant and thriving restaurant scene, with flavors, cuisines, and budgets to meet anyone’s needs.

Take a look at this website and use it as a potential guide when planning your next visit. I can guarantee you’ll go away with a much better perspective on what the city has to offer.

Again, sorry you had a negative experience. Definitely more of the exception than the norm.

#27

no corndogs…

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#28

No complaints on the food - loved it!

#29

I personally really liked the venue for Detroit. Although until you got to ford field it didn’t feel as massive and awe inspiring like the venue for St. Louis did. I’ve always wondered why not have all 6 divisions in ford field (although I might not be thinking of some logistical reasons not to) Also next time your in Detroit make sure to check out the Detroit princess river boat. My team took a ride on it and it was lots of fun.

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#30

I am not a fan of the Cobo center, like some have said it feels like a super-regional / super-district event.

I have heard that there is insufficient space at Ford Field for all of the pits, which I question but I’m too lazy to calculate right now. From being there (Ford), it looks like if you were to put all of the fields very close to the field periphery and some mobile stands on the field, you would be able to accommodate a lot more spectators. Pits would go in the center of the field. There might be some overflow area needed for pits, apparently there are few domes with convention centers attached, which St. Louis had and which allowed for both.

Maybe I have not accounted for and left enough room for robot and human travel paths in the pit area so it’s just not feasible.

I have heard this sentiment from a lot of people, it would be great to do all of the Einstein Round Robin at Ford Field, it would definitely allow for the excitement to be maintained all of the way through Einstein round. I understand that logistically it is much more difficult than just moving two teams, but First doesn’t get to have it both ways. They chose to split champs, they chose the venues, and they chose Ford Field for it’s grandiosity. Well, then make a spectacle of it, do it right and host all of Einstein round robin and champs field there. It would permit better scheduling of the other First league playoffs, as well as the Chairman’s awards etc., and guarantee a much larger audience.

In the end I just would like it to be in a big and kind of grand facility rather than Cobo, which St. Louis provided. One champs would be nice but I’m OK with two.

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#31

Yeah i’d have to agree with a lot your saying. It would be nice to have Detroit all in ford field but I’m fine with cobo. Its still nice.

#32

For some comparisons:
A football field is roughly 60,000 square feet.
A hockey rink is roughly 17,000 square feet.
Cobo Center advertises itself as 723,000 square feet.

The North Star Regional is a 60 team event with a field and pits on the floor of a hockey rink.
Based on that - with no additional seating, they probably could squeeze 3 divisions in Ford Field.

The Great Northern Regional is a 60 team event (not filled) held on the floor of a football field. It was a fairly spacious regional with a full lunch area, full size practice field, 40 foot wide aisles in the pits, large amount of extra seating on both ends of the arena, and a fair amount of sponsor demonstration area (including an F16). Our thought at that event is they could easily fit another regional in the same building at the same time but not 3.