Well, I'm sorry, but I've attended (counts) four European Worldcon (The Hague, Glasgow x2, and London), and the complaints are almost the same every single time. Oh, it's different people making them, but the complaints themselves never change.(Incidentally, in 1990 in The Hague, I was in one of the farthest-away con hotels, with a tram ride necessary from the hotel to the convention center. The travel time was roughly what I'm facing next year in Helsinki. Okay, yes, I was 27 years younger than I am now, but I and the rest of the San Francisco in 1993 Worldcon bid dealt with it.)
For information, here's what you can expect of any Worldcon not held in a major American city: Lots of smaller hotels, spread out over a larger area than you would expect. This doesn't change. There are only a handful of cities in the USA that have mega hotels either with or immediately adjacent to convention space large enough to hold a Worldcon. Unless we limit ourselves to perhaps as many as ten US cities for Worldcon (if that), this is going to happen every single year.
See also last year's Worldcon in Spokane, which is one of the smallest cities that has ever held a Worldcon, and Reno in 2011, which is in a dead heat with Spokane for that title. Both of them were bitterly criticized for the vast distances between the convention center and their hotels, and neither of which had "one big hotel with enough rooms to house most or all of the members" adjacent to it. Even the Chicago Hyatt, which is the closest to a "one roof Worldcon" we've had all of the years I've been attending (back to 1984) isn't enough.
Of course, we could consider limiting Worldcon to only about 2000 attendees or so, which would not only significantly reduce the cost but also make it much easier to fit into smaller, more compact facilities. But personally I don't think that's a good idea.
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timeasmymeasure
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Date: 2016-09-03 08:15 pm (UTC)For information, here's what you can expect of any Worldcon not held in a major American city: Lots of smaller hotels, spread out over a larger area than you would expect. This doesn't change. There are only a handful of cities in the USA that have mega hotels either with or immediately adjacent to convention space large enough to hold a Worldcon. Unless we limit ourselves to perhaps as many as ten US cities for Worldcon (if that), this is going to happen every single year.
See also last year's Worldcon in Spokane, which is one of the smallest cities that has ever held a Worldcon, and Reno in 2011, which is in a dead heat with Spokane for that title. Both of them were bitterly criticized for the vast distances between the convention center and their hotels, and neither of which had "one big hotel with enough rooms to house most or all of the members" adjacent to it. Even the Chicago Hyatt, which is the closest to a "one roof Worldcon" we've had all of the years I've been attending (back to 1984) isn't enough.
Of course, we could consider limiting Worldcon to only about 2000 attendees or so, which would not only significantly reduce the cost but also make it much easier to fit into smaller, more compact facilities. But personally I don't think that's a good idea.