Thanks Reed! Do you want to be on the planning team list? 
I have forwarded your email to them. The short of it is, we 
need to create a list that contains enough hotels on the metro 
with rates < $200/night to house all participants. That way people
can get cheap rooms and commute to the conference easy if they
want, else pay an outrageous rate in the Penn Quarter for convenience.

In general, it might be nice to direct a large number of people
towards Dupont if there are cheap hotels there, then
we can easily congregate in one place for dinner/drinks/etc.

On Wed, Apr 23, 2008 at 07:36:47AM -0400, Reed O'Brien wrote:[...]
[...]

About 2 blocks from the East Falls Church metro off the orange line is
an Econo Lodge.  Free internet access to boot.

http://www.econolodge.com/ires/en-US/html/HotelInfo?hotel=VA166&promo=gglocal

Since I go past it every day on the way to work, I can see whats
involved in working out a special deal for Plone Conference attendees.

On Wed, Apr 23, 2008 at 7:36 AM, Reed O'Brien <reed(at)reedobrien.com>
wrote:[...]

[...]

On Wed, Apr 23, 2008 at 07:49:21AM -0400, Daniel Greenfeld wrote:[...]

Please do!
[...]
[...]

There are also a number of large hotels in Crystal City which, as you know,
is easily reached via Metro.

On Wed, Apr 23, 2008 at 7:36 AM, Reed O'Brien <reed(at)reedobrien.com>
wrote:
[...]

[...]

Crystal City seems to be suffering the same fate as DC, overpricing during
that time period. But there is a nice one in Ballston:

http://tinyurl.com/6llws4

A *great* site for finding all of these is travelocity (I'm sure there are
others), it even gives you the average price you can expect to pay in the area 
during that time, which is ~$280.

On Wed, Apr 23, 2008 at 08:05:55AM -0400, EricBrian wrote:[...]
[...]

On Apr 23, 2008, at 7:50 AM, Alex Clark wrote:
[...]

Um, I will be in/on mother africa for a month and out of pocket.  
Otherwise I would love to help.

There are also a lot of rooming houses/B&Bs around Dupont.  The Dupont  
Marriott has a ton of rooms and I think a lot of suites.  If there are  
people willing to share you can probably secure some 2room suites  
there for under 200 each person.

The omni is a big conference hotel  maybe you can get a deal one or  
both of those.  I think unfortunately they would do it only if you  
were holding the conference there.

There are a lot of cheap places in the burbs...yuck. and far.

Then again my room in Napoli was pretty shady, about 150US a night and  
a 20-25 minute cab ride from the conference.  I cabbed the whole time  
since I had a busted ankle and didn't want to deal with standing  
around on a bus...

.02$US  or 0.0125458€

~ro

kayak.com

On Apr 23, 2008, at 8:12 AM, Alex Clark wrote:
[...][...]
>>> The Churchill Hotel - Dupont Circle
>>> Windsor Park - Dupont
>>> State plaza - Dupont
>>> Carlyle Suites - Dupont
>>> Omni Shoram - Adams Morgan/Dupont - Big conference hotel
>>> The Channel Inn - Waterfront
>>> Best Western - Waterfront/Downtown
>>> River Inn - Foggy Bottom
>>> One Washington Circle - Foggy Bottom
>>> The Wardman Park Marriott has a lot of rooms.
>>> The Quincy - Downtown
>>>
>>> Savoy Suites - Upper NW/Cathedral Heights
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> **Yikes**
>>> HoJo on NY Ave - Yikes
>>> Kellogg  - Galludet
>>> President Inn - Galludet
>>> Motel 6 - Brightwood
>>>
>>>
>>> Alexandria/SilverSpring/College Park are all metro accessible and 

>>> probably
>>> have some "reasonable" hotels. Of course if you want teh real  
>>> americana feel
>>> you need to be in a motor inn in a more rural county and a car,  
>>> nee a truck.
>>>
>>> --
>>> To unsubscribe send an email with subject 'unsubscribe' to
>>> zpugdc(at)lists.zpugdc.org.
>>> Please contact zpugdc-owner(at)lists.zpugdc.org for questions.
>>> http://zpugdc.org/lists/zpugdc/archive/2008/2008-04/1208950324030
>>>[...][...]

Might be better than Kayak: hotels.mapchannels.com

Searching on Washington Dc (and close burbs) for October 8, 3 nights
shows a couple cheapies:

Motel 6 $86
President Inn $100
Inns of Virginia (Arl) $120
Windosor Inn $160
Raddison (Arl) $161
Embassy Inn $170
Best Western $185
Kellogg Conference $195

or the convenient Willard Intergalactic for a paltry $600/night


The real question is: what's our Piazza Dante going to be?  :-)

would we get better rates if we could book these in blocks, ie. arrange a
group rate?

-kapil

On Wed, Apr 23, 2008 at 3:19 PM, Chris Shenton <chris(at)shenton.org>
wrote:
[...]

On 4/23/2008 7:49 AM, Daniel Greenfeld wrote:[...]

I've stayed there. Not completely shabby. Cheap.
[...]

I've had colleagues come to town with reservations at the President's
Inn.  I do not recommend it.  The hotel is in a very inconvenient part
of town if you aren't comfortable driving in DC.  Some web sites put it
within walking distance of the Metro, but it's a very unpleasant walk.
People have reported their car being vandalized even as they were
checking in. 

Here is what some people have said:


Chris Estes
Web Developer 
National Board
For Professional Teaching Standards
WWW.NBPTS.ORG <http://www.nbpts.org/>
National Board Certified Teachers Promote...
Better Teaching, Better learning, Better Schools

-----Original Message-----
From: Chris Shenton [mailto:chris(at)shenton.org] 
Sent: Wednesday, April 23, 2008 3:19 PM
To: zpugdc(at)lists.zpugdc.org
Cc: plone-conference-2008-dc-planning-discussion(at)lists.openplans.org
Subject: Re: [ZPUGDC] hotels

Might be better than Kayak: hotels.mapchannels.com

Searching on Washington Dc (and close burbs) for October 8, 3 nights
shows a couple cheapies:

Motel 6 $86
President Inn $100
Inns of Virginia (Arl) $120
Windosor Inn $160
Raddison (Arl) $161
Embassy Inn $170
Best Western $185
Kellogg Conference $195

or the convenient Willard Intergalactic for a paltry $600/night


The real question is: what's our Piazza Dante going to be?  :-)


[...]

My apologies:

http://www.tripadvisor.com/Hotel_Review-g28970-d123974-Reviews-President
_Inn-Washington_DC_District_of_Columbia.html#REVIEWS

Chris Estes
Web Developer 
National Board
For Professional Teaching Standards
WWW.NBPTS.ORG <http://www.nbpts.org/>
National Board Certified Teachers Promote...
Better Teaching, Better learning, Better Schools

-----Original Message-----
From: Chris Shenton [mailto:chris(at)shenton.org] 
Sent: Wednesday, April 23, 2008 3:19 PM
To: zpugdc(at)lists.zpugdc.org
Cc: plone-conference-2008-dc-planning-discussion(at)lists.openplans.org
Subject: Re: [ZPUGDC] hotels

Might be better than Kayak: hotels.mapchannels.com

Searching on Washington Dc (and close burbs) for October 8, 3 nights
shows a couple cheapies:

Motel 6 $86
President Inn $100
Inns of Virginia (Arl) $120
Windosor Inn $160
Raddison (Arl) $161
Embassy Inn $170
Best Western $185
Kellogg Conference $195

or the convenient Willard Intergalactic for a paltry $600/night


The real question is: what's our Piazza Dante going to be?  :-)


[...]

right I put it with other hotels in neighborhoods for advanced users  
only...under the Yikes heading. All really cheap but in um, higher  
risk neighborhoods.

**Yikes**
HoJo on NY Ave - Yikes
Kellogg  - Galludet
President Inn - Galludet
Motel 6 - Brightwood


On Apr 23, 2008, at 4:42 PM, Christopher Estes wrote:
[...]

Reed O'Brien wrote:[...]

As someone who's worked at Gallaudet longer than I care to mention, I'll 
weigh in.  While I'm not necessarily endorsing it, the Kellogg Hotel and 
Conference Center at Gallaudet University is reasonably safe.  Wandering 
around off-campus, marginal, but I frequently walk to the metro. There are 
regular university shuttles from Union Station (which also stop at the NY 
Ave / FL Ave / Gallaudet metro station).  There's also a "special" hotel 
shuttle which I know nothing about.

http://www.kelloggconferencehotel.com/

However, food off-campus?  Nothing really in the neighborhood.

No idea how many rooms the Kellogg has, though the web site above probably 
has that detail, and I'm too lazy to look. ;-)

I cooked up a Google map for a three-day Zope sprint we had last year: 25 
participants, most of whom were high school students and no one died. ;-)
You'll find the map here:

http://tinyurl.com/2ldf52

(They stayed in the dorms, which isn't an option unless you're doing stuff 
in the summer.)
[...]

> No idea how many rooms the Kellogg has, though the web site above [...]

Actually, from the home page:

"...hotel offers 93 newly renovated guestrooms..."

I would be more worried that people that don't speak read english as a  
first language might wander off into trinidad without knowing.

I don't think that the area right around the campus is so bad, but  
after a night drinking...and making the wrong turn coming out of the  
subway...

For the paranoid, curious or cautious:

http://www.crimeindc.org/

~ro


On Apr 23, 2008, at 7:00 PM, Kevin Cole wrote:
[...][...][...]

Reed O'Brien wrote:[...]

I forgot that it would be a more international crowd than I was thinking of.
[...]

True: The high school students who were sprinting weren't getting drunk... 
Or if they were, they were doing it in the comfort of their dorm rooms. ;-)

On Wed, Apr 23, 2008 at 03:24:21PM -0400, Kapil Thangavelu wrote:[...]

Yes, but that typically involves spending money up front, which we'd like to
avoid
if possible.
[...]
[...]

Right, obviously we want to avoid bad neighborhoods at all costs. This
is essentially why we are having it at the Reagan Building instead
of the Convention Center.

On Wed, Apr 23, 2008 at 04:42:55PM -0400, Christopher Estes wrote:[...]
[...]

Interesting, thanks Kevin!

On Wed, Apr 23, 2008 at 07:00:11PM -0400, Kevin Cole wrote:[...]


[...]

On Wed, Apr 23, 2008 at 09:39:06PM -0400, Alex Clark wrote:[...]

/me is amused, I spent a lot of time in all these "bad" neighborhoods
when I lived in DC. ;)

The most important things, really, for suggested hotels are:

- we have a range of prices. even if it's the uncharming Motel 6 or
  slightly-sketchy hotel, there are people who need to pay $125 a night

- we provide an easy way for people who might want to share hotel rooms
  to do so. a wiki page or mailing list or such, frequently mentioned,
  would do

- we provide hotel recommendations in "clumps", ie:
   Dupont Circle (4 hotels suggested)
   Ballston (3 hotels suggested)
   Right around conference center (3 htels suggested)

  It's not possible for everyone to stay near everyone, but that way,
  everyone that is at a recommended hotel will be near some other
  people. That may be the best we can do.

- we have realistic estimates of how to get to conference from hotels
  (ie, "from Dupont Circle, it's a 15 minute metro ride [describe], or
  a $20 cab fare", etc)

Most people that have bad memories of conference hotels in Plone are
thinking of Naples, where the conference location was great, but there
was one hotel by there, and it was WAAAAY out of town. The recommended
hotels were all pretty pricey, and all over town. And it was ~45 mins on
the bus from my hotel  to the conf center. I think we can do much better
than that, *without* having to have everyone stay at expensive,
close-to-Reagan hotels, etc.

Hope everyone is doing well! It's exciting to see all this planning come
together.

Thanks, EVERYONE, for your help in getting this process really rolling!

Best,

- j.
[...]

On Wednesday, April 23, 2008 9:39pm, Alex Clark <aclark(at)aclark.net>
said:
[...]

I really don't care where this event is being held, but it's *nuts* to say that
the Convention Center n'hood is a bad one. You obviously haven't been there
lately.

Our office [1] is there and, as several people on this list can attest, it's in
a quite lovely "hood".

Well, so much for any thoughts I had of offering our office as a place for
Plone meetings in the future! :>

Cheers,
Kendall Clark

[1] http://clarkparsia.com/

On Wednesday, April 23, 2008 9:42pm, Joel Burton <joel(at)joelburton.com>
said:
[...]

Here's another clump, near the so-called "bad" Convention Center neighborhood:

http://clarkparsia.com/about/hotels

We point visitors to all of these and the hotels are fine.

Cheers,
Kendall Clark

On Wed, Apr 23, 2008 at 10:01 PM, <kendall(at)clarkparsia.com> wrote:
[...]
convention center is a nice neighborhood.. its also really convenient on the
metro.. its a straight shot down the green line to l'enfant plaza and the
conference location ( <10m ), and its a quick hop to chinatown eats/foods..

cheers,

kapil

On Apr 23, 2008, at 9:42 PM, Joel Burton wrote:
[...][...][...]

I did not mean to imply that there are no fly zones, just that people  
should be aware that certain neighborhoods have richer histories than  
others .  I don't think that they should be discounted as via options  
for people to book rooms, but that there should be caveats.  I ride  
through Old City to get to the H Street Corridor which has some great  
nightlife...   I think it is fine. It is an older section of town than  
received little money to rebuild after the '68 riots.  I personally  
don't think I would feel comfortable wandering into Trinidad or Ivy  
City at night; especially if I don't speak the language.

Caveats are all I think need be said.  Of course everyone knows if all  
the places are $2-600US a night and they get a place for $99US, it is  
for a reason.  Maybe that is enough.
[...]

Motel 6 is in a fine neighborhood near Walter Reed.  It is a quiet  
older neighborhood.  I lived in Brightwood for a couple years and  
liked it. It is 5 miles or so north of downtown. About 20-25 minute  
walk to the Takoma Park Metro (Red Line) or maybe a little further  
south to Petworth (Green Line).  There was a great little bar there  
called Temperance Hall, it is now called The Looking Glass and I have  
heard lackluster things about it recently.
[...]

Other things that would do well on the wiki are a neighborhood map!!!

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/93/DC_neighborhoods_map.png

Neighborhood info:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_neighborhoods_of_the_District_of_Columbia_by_ward

I have lived in and around Brightwood, Petworth and  Columbia Heights  
since 2000.  They are all perfectly nice places. I now live in what my  
plat says is Old City #2 and my block captain says is the southeast  
corner of Lincoln Park.  She has lived on my block longer than I have  
been alive so I call the neighborhood Lincoln Park.  I think it really  
falls into Barney Circle though and is listed as such in the map  
above.  Barney Circle was the trolley turn around where my father used  
to catch the trolley into town.  He grew up in the Anacostia  
neighborhood.  There is another plone person that lives in Kingman  
Park, just to the north of me.

Sometimes neighborhoods simply refer to a traffic circle.  There are a  
number of circles in DC.  Wikipedia, of course has a list of most of  
the landmark ones:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Circles_in_Washington%2C_D.C.

Enough babbling about neighborhoods.
[...]


If the appeals process goes on for a year we likely won't have meters  
in the cabs.  In that case; the fare calculator is probably the best  
way to make sure you know how much to expect to pay.  If you haven't  
ever been in a cab that uses zones instead of meters, it is difficult  
to calculate how much you owe since the zone maps are pretty  
information sparse and you have to know it or trust the driver. ...
http://citizenatlas.dc.gov/atlasapps/taxifare.aspx


DC is also very bike-able. There are a lot of convenient trails to get  
into and around town as well as bike lanes. Though I image most people  
won't bring a bicycle with them.
[...]

On 23/04/2008, Reed O'Brien <reed(at)reedobrien.com> wrote:[...]

With regards to neighborhoods, I don't think we should push for people
staying outside the city, or even near the district borders; it may
cost a bit less, but pricy hotels were part of the package when
conference locations were selected.

Let's recommend hotels within walking distance to some of the more
interesting quarters of the city, i.e. Dupont, 18th street, U street
corridor, ...

\malthe
[...]
[...]

On Thu, Apr 24, 2008 at 09:30:57AM +0200, Malthe Borch wrote:[...]

Wow, this is a big topic for people ;)

I think we're all pretty much in agreement, though from slightly
different angles. 

- Yes, we'll have a list of decent hotels in places like Dupont and near
  the Reagan building

However, I think, whether we like it or not, we're going to have people
that need to stay at cheaper places. It's not a question of "pushing"
these places or not, but with airfare, conference registration, and food, 
the conference costs well over $1,200 for some participants--before they
even consider their hotel or add-ons like classes. Some people will
*only* be able to come if we have a list of "budget" hotels. It's fine
if we call them that, and it's fine if people understand those aren't as
close to the social areas as other places (it's also helpful, for those
who haven't been a Plone conference to know, that, while many people are
interested in the social stuff at the conference, a lot of people also
are coming for work, and -aren't- going to hang out in the evening with
conference participants, too).

So, is Joanna the person who is offering to put together the list?
Is there a timeline for a list to offer people?

- j
[...]

On Thu, Apr 24, 2008 at 07:34:20AM +0000, Joel Burton wrote:[...]

Yes, and most discussion is taking place on the planning list. The 
timeline is roughly ASAP. With a pre-planning survey going out today,
and a call for proposals going out by the end of this month, I'd
realistically like to have that list available early May.
[...]
[...]

OK, I was hugely busy and am trying to catch up...  I
also had to skip many of the intermediary emails as
well :-( So Hopefully this isn't far off from what
y'all might want.  Should I cross post back to the
planning list?

Any proposal from hotels will need some commitment on
# of rooms (I would imagine).  I would highly
recommend the following type arrangement in the RFP:

- the need for our conference is to accommodate
roughly X% of those attending (~Y number); 
- your response must include the expected number you
can expect to accommodate and the cost per person;
- at your discretion, you can set thresholds, at X#,
you get A cost, at Y#, you get B cost; 
- this may be awarded to multiple hotels in order to
assure we can accommodate the needs of attendees

I would definitely hit Marriott again Alex since we
have talked with them.  They were willing to help us
even if we chose Reagan which we did.

Hopefully this is helpful...

Paul


--- Alex Clark <aclark(at)aclark.net> wrote:
[...]





     
____________________________________________________________________________________
Be a better friend, newshound, and 
know-it-all with Yahoo! Mobile.  Try it now.  http://mobile.yahoo.com/;_ylt=Ahu06i62sR8HDtDypao8Wcj9tAcJ

Joel Burton <joel(at)joelburton.com> writes:
[...]

One thing I struggled with in Naples was finding how to get from my
hotel to the Center: folks were left to fend for themselves pretty much
and it's a vast city.  This was exacerbated by my inability to
communicate in Italian, but also by unpublished bus/rail schedule
changes and new/closed train/tram/subway stations.  After the first day
everything was fine but we can offer more guidance.

We should provide -- for each "clump" -- instructions to Metro rail,
bus, ART bus (if Arlington), taxi and walking.  Times, costs, transfers,
rush/nonrush service, etc.  (e.g., get your rail-to-bus transfer at your
Originating station, not the terminus; SmartTrip cards work on rail and
bus and can be bought in smallish chunks).  Warn folks about DC's
traffic; it's not Naples, but it's not fun.

Let's put up links to wmata.com's maps and Trip Planner,
CommuterPage.com's local bus timetables and maps, etc.  I have no idea
how anyone's gonna explain the DC taxi zone system to to people :-) but
maybe they'll all have meters by then.

/me sounds like I've just volunteered for some content creation...

Excerpts from Shenton, Chris (HQ-LD070)[InDyne, Inc]'s message of Mon Apr 28
11:01:57 -0400 2008:
[...]

Yes, Fenty is pushing this pretty hard, so I think we won't have to
explain the zones. Which sucks, since, as a DC taxi-user, I like the
zones.
 
I agree w/ the rest of what you said, Chris, and I will help you with
gathering some of that info, if you'd like.

Cheers,
Kendall

On Apr 28, 2008, at 11:01 AM, Chris Shenton wrote:
[...][...][...]

I posted a link in an earlier email:
http://citizenatlas.dc.gov/atlasapps/taxifare.aspx

[...]

Kendall Grant Clark <kendall(at)clarkparsia.com> writes:
[...]

I don't suppose you want to help me with a wiki about good food 'n'
drink in the area, do ya? :-)

Excerpts from Shenton, Chris (HQ-LD070)[InDyne, Inc]'s message of Mon Apr 28
11:31:35 -0400 2008:[...]

I'd rather do that than document travel details... :>

Cheers,
Kendall