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GA 2010 Rally After Action Report

durhamtown

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the 4" pipe is a sewer line and water can be extended

I will also try to install a couple of security lights for new year

just remind me of these things before you show up...lol

mike
DP
 

CARNAC

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Clint and I discussed the security gate 'thing'. I plan to do it next year since I mind the store anyway. I think it is managable but will be even more so if I can get the wifey to come.

I am committed to having a hand washing station (either ad hoc or a real one) at each port-a-pot location. Either that or no more hand shaking :drool::lol:

Neil,

I didn't know the guy was not part of us, nor did I even know that he was in our area. You're right, the behavior was childish and not what we stand for...whatever that is LOL.

Mike,

Thanks for coming onto the site and thanks for all you provided. It was a wonderful time and look forward to next year. Maybe we can work on some things together on these ideas as the year progresses. Look forward to it.
 

Chief_919

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Clint and I discussed the security gate 'thing'. I plan to do it next year since I mind the store anyway. I think it is managable but will be even more so if I can get the wifey to come.
I can help with the gate as well if needed, unless HRC has other plans for my available year...........
 

hndrsonj

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Actually if we just slid to the left a bit and put out a table we would have been right at the gate and we always had someone sitting there.:grin:
 

CARNAC

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Looks like between the 4 of us (TWRIGHT, Jim, Chief919, and myself), we will have a mission for next year that will take care of 80% of the safety, security, info services issue brought up on here. Bring your Shore Patrol and MP brazzards, LOL.
 

Chief_919

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Looks like between the 4 of us (TWRIGHT, Jim, Chief919, and myself), we will have a mission for next year that will take care of 80% of the safety, security, info services issue brought up on here. Bring your Shore Patrol and MP brazzards, LOL.

I have a big sign somewhere that reads 'ROADSIDE DISPATCH CHECK":p
 

clinto

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Ok, a few things.

Much thanks to Carnac for creating this thread and for formatting it and then most everyone else following the format.

I want to discuss a few things.

A. I had planned on putting up some signage directing rally attendees to the field, but I was sick with bronchitis right before the rally and I lost 4 days of prep work-honestly, I am lucky I was able to attend. Next year I will make some signs.

B. We had planned and anticipated having a Public Address (PA) system this year like what we had last year, but the person who was going to let us use his screwed us over at the last minute, leaving us unable to acquire a replacement. I will look for something next year. I would love to have some kind of programmable sign with a digital readout that could be put up in a central location (near the campfire) that could be programmed to read whatever we wanted (i.e. "Next trailride departs 1330 hours", "Lunch will be ready at 1130 hours", etc.). That may be technologically and financially out of reach.

C. Spots/Parking - I am not sure what to do about this but Carnac is definitely correct about potentially running out of room. The problem is that it would be an epic amount of work to mark out spaces-we'd have to agree on what size to make them, then mark them off and make sure we are leaving enough room for people with long trailers to get in. Just the sheer amount of either paint or engineer's tape (this is what Carnac used to mark off the MKT and campfire areas) is overwhelming. I think we would be better served (for now) by expanding into the bottom portion of the field that we didn't use this year. If you came in through the open gate and turned to the right and headed down the field, towards the area Zout and Drew (I think that's his name) took with their M109 and M35's, you'd see more open field to their right. I think next year we will direct people into that area in order to make sure we don't run out of room.

D. Head count - I've always wanted an accurate head count but the difficulty in obtaining it kept us from doing so. In all honesty, the only purpose having a head count serves is to try and plan for how much food to buy and for record keeping purposes (growth rate, etc.). The only practical way would be a manned gate and wristbands. I'll get to the manned gate issue in a minute.

E. 73M819 said: "name tags that can be put in tag holders so tags are not lost, this we could use ONE tag per person". The problem with this is that the rally would have to foot the bill and the rally uses what little profit it makes from the MKT for the next year's food. I thought Kenny's name tags worked well this year and if we had a manned gate, we could give each rally attendee a few nametag stickers.

F. 73M819 said "every MV is given a numbered tag to id that truck, a master log is kept with the id numbers, this will tell who owns it, what it is, anything special, so if someone or a VISTOR wents to know about the truck , the owner can be found" A good idea but a LOT of work for a potentially unlikely situation. Probably not enough payoff for a lot of work.

G. 73M819 said "mandatory gathering at a set time each day to cover rally info" - impossible-you'll never get even 25% of the people to show up. How do I make it mandatory? Threaten to throw them out if they don't show up? I've run a lot of events and believe me, things like this never work.

H. BlythewoodJoe said: "One thing I would suggest would be a central command post of some kind with a bulletin board or some other devise where the days quasi plans would be posted. I understand most of the events where plan as you go, but a more announced trail rides would be nice. I didn't plan to ride much but it seems I would notice people leaving before I had a chance to prepare my truck and get in line." This was definitely a problem. Without either a set schedule or a functioning PA system, the trailride notification system was lacking. I am not sure what I want to do about this. Setting a schedule is easy-sticking to it is near impossible. We tried running them on a schedule in the past and it was just a nightmare trying to stick to it (and we ultimately failed).

Now, the bulletin board is a great idea and since we are going to have a command tent and a manned checkpoint this year, we can easily have a dry erase board. We can put whatever announcements on the dry erase board we need to (lunch will be hamburgers and will be served at 1230 hours, trailrides at 1330 hours). As people come through the gate, they can be told "If you have questions, come to the dry erase board!".

I. Command tent/manned gate/etc. One of the reasons I have never tried to do this, even though it would solve a lot of problems is that it's a thankless task. It would eat up a person's entire day and keep them from being able to go on trailrides, it would greatly limit them being able to socialize and would hurt them if they were trying to sell stuff. I absolutely hate the idea of asking someone to do this. If there are volunteers that is great but I really hate the idea of having to have someone do this as it will turn the rally into more work than relaxation for them. I know that for me, I was not able to do nearly as many trailrides as I wanted and there were tons of people I never even got to meet in between rally responsibilities and trying to help clintogf with her vendor space. If a person is going to man the gate and be the primary POC for fresh arrivals I recommend we schedule it so that they only have to do it one day, leaving there other days free for socializing/trailrides/swap meeting, etc.

In closing, a lot of good ideas have been posted in this thread and some of them are definitely going to put into play (Joe's bulletin board, a command tent, a manned gate check, etc.). Some of them would require too much work to be feasible.

This year, we concentrated on really growing the rally-getting vendors to show up and pushing up the attendance #'s. I think now with 75 trucks, at least a dozen vendors and at least 200 people, we can concentrate this year on improving the organization of the rally.

The primary things I want to work on are (in order of importance to me):

1. A fixed menu for the MKT that doesn't change.
2. Some kind of better organization for the trailrides: Either a set schedule or announcements 1 hour ahead of departure time.
3. Refine the vendor area (get everyone on the left side of the lane)
4. Properly use the camping area to it's maximum potential

The fixed menu should be easier this year; with last year's and this year's profits, we are already a large amount in the black, which will allow Mike and Wreckerman to set a menu ahead of time and follow it, regardless of price fluctuations in the marketplace for raw materials.

The trailride organization will be solved with either one or a combination of several things. A bulletin board at the manned checkpoint or the command tent and a PA system. It's either that or a rigid schedule that is not allowed to change. I don't see another way around it.

Refining the vendor area is pretty easy-as people come in the gate, the gatekeeper directs them to the right area and if they don't comply, they get asked to comply. Same goes for the camping area.
 

bkwudzhom

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ga
I would like to thank all of you who put in the effort to pull this thing off. It was my first rally and the wife and I had a great time. My son was almost overwhelmed. He stayed so excited I thought we were going to have to give him Valum to get him in the bed every night!
Special thanks to Doghead for taking the time to look us up and ensure my son got a trail ride. (Hopefully my truck will be there next year as well!!)

As for suggestions I have to agree with Blythwoodjoe that the overall loose/self orginization of the event is one of the coolest parts of the whole thing.

Having a CP tent at the gate would help tremdously. Here several things could be covered with minimal manpower. A volunteer sheet could be offered to cover blocks of time to assist in manning the CP and KP duties. It is simple, easy and allows EVERYONE to enjoy the rally.

My 2 cnts.
 
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Recovry4x4

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Greetings folks! Clinto, any way of you snapping some pics of the sign in book? Would be fun to read over that. I think for the most part, folks did sign in.

Name tags; if folks want to purchase their own credential holders, these tags will fit right in there. I suppose I underestimated the number of name tags required, won't happen again. I may just bring the printer next year and do some of them there.

Gate duties, great idea but I think I'd break it up into smaller blocks, say 4 to 6 hours. I'd bet enough people would step up for this. We should look into a goody bag with a sticker or something in it to give folks when the register. Perhaps even a map of the grounds. I think we could come up with some garage sale type signs to post in certain areas as well.

Lets continue to brainstorm and put this together. If folks can step up and take on a single task in prep, would make for a nice improvement. As I said, I'll do name tags and even check with Polverone about making a batch of stickers, even if they are small, for attendees. I have a great idea for this and will work on it. I would still like to do colored dots on vehicles so that we know that they have been counted.
 
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Chief_919

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E. 73M819 said: "name tags that can be put in tag holders so tags are not lost, this we could use ONE tag per person". The problem with this is that the rally would have to foot the bill and the rally uses what little profit it makes from the MKT for the next year's food. I thought Kenny's name tags worked well this year and if we had a manned gate, we could give each rally attendee a few nametag stickers.
I think I have a box with 300-400 of the small plastic name tag holders. let me dig, if I do I will donate them.

Heck, if I don't, I will buy some for the rally. A few bucks to help a great event is too easy.
I. Command tent/manned gate/etc. One of the reasons I have never tried to do this, even though it would solve a lot of problems is that it's a thankless task. It would eat up a person's entire day and keep them from being able to go on trailrides, it would greatly limit them being able to socialize and would hurt them if they were trying to sell stuff. I absolutely hate the idea of asking someone to do this. If there are volunteers that is great but I really hate the idea of having to have someone do this as it will turn the rally into more work than relaxation for them. I know that for me, I was not able to do nearly as many trailrides as I wanted and there were tons of people I never even got to meet in between rally responsibilities and trying to help clintogf with her vendor space. If a person is going to man the gate and be the primary POC for fresh arrivals I recommend we schedule it so that they only have to do it one day, leaving there other days free for socializing/trailrides/swap meeting, etc.

Just a thought, but a number of us that have volunteered to man the gate were also vendors. If we set some dealer spaces for those who will also man the gate right there at the gate, doing double duty would be pretty easy. 95% of the time I was at my setup, and splitting it between a few of us like that would not be a big deal.
 

REGULATOR

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I plan to attend next year, and possibly will drag another 2-3 Ham radio operators with me.

as we get closer its possible that you could set up your white board or message board at this table.

we could also set up a sign that says Information, and a sign at the front gate directing any one to the "information table"

from this table we will work some radios, and we can post some basic check in procedures, and sign in sheets etc.

This also gives us a chance to ID any one with green radios

we were set up not far from the MKT this year, next year we could be similar spot but near the front gate to answer any questions and distribute information.



as far as trail rides: I suggest you do it two ways, propose soem general trail ride activities, IE morning, after lunch, after dinner

then you also on the white board, have anyone who wants to go go sign up,
looking for trail ride around 1000 am etc

If more people get the Military green radios, or Amateur radios we can have a lot better comms on the trail and in camp.

I know we looked at several radios through the event to see if they worked.
 

EMD567

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Clinto,
I have an LED scrolling message board that I will let the Rally use. It is fairly simple to program, and all it needs is 110 volts AC to make it go.
You can change the message in a matter of minutes. It would work for the MKT menu, chow times, trailride times and what not.
 

Squirt-Truck

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I really like the proposal of having POSTED times to leave for trail rides. We passed the word roughly an hour ahead and missed every departure time we set this rally.
DT has so many different tril styles now that we really need rides based on technical difficulty. Just not sure how to do that with a dedicated lead vehicle. (Little-Truck son of Squirt) We will work on that.

We tried to direct incoming traffic into the open areas of the field, I suggest that in addition to being more specific as to what and where we try to get the information posted earlier.

We need to MAINTAIN a dedicated travel lane. Keep the speeds down. Limit the ATV's and bikes.

That Jeep Cherokee that adopted us, (the one that Dumpster pulled back with Lloyds towbar) was NOT, NEVER, NO WAY, with any of us. That boy was crazy and dangerious.

Now the forest green jeep with the orange wheels, (previously red) has rode with us for the last three years. He is a part of us and I will personally deal with him SEVERELY if he does anything close to what crazy boy did.

We were WAY to tolerent of drinking and operating vehicles. NO NO NO NO

MKT menu posted. CP great idea.

DT really rolled the red clay er carpet out for us. Mike, many thanks, looking to more trails and more challenges. You and the tree crew and dozer operator now have a feel for the space required for the big trucks. We will welcome the DT staff to participate.

Overall it will only get better, BUT, we all need to participate in supporting Clint in working this rally, that way no one gets burned and he gets to enjoy also.
 

tigger

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Some more trash cans would help. I think every one has great ideas lets make next year even better. and most of all be safe while having fun!
 

Monica

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Sanitation:

Hand-wash station at the MKT, tying in to the available piping sounds great, and like it's under control.

For the porta johns, one thing I have seen work well is a bottle of alcohol hand sanitizer at each. Medium sized bottles, and someone to refill as needed.

If there are lights up next year, having at least some porta's under the lights would make night-time runs a LOT easier.
 

swbradley1

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That Jeep Cherokee that adopted us, (the one that Dumpster pulled back with Lloyds towbar) was NOT, NEVER, NO WAY, with any of us. That boy was crazy and dangerious.
You got that right. When I was sitting in Gimpy's truck while we were waiting get, uh, pulled out of the mud that kid managed to come flying up out of the other mud-hole and all I could see was his Jeep headed right for my side. Since he had the accelerator all the way to floor I was worried he couldn't get it stopped in time. I also watched him pop out the drive shaft on red canyon run when he tried too steep a climb. He also did a donut in front of another truck and right behind us on another ride. No, I'm sure you are safe in saying he wasn't with us. sw
 

poppop

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I have not had a lot of time to get on site lately and this is the first time I have read this thread thru. A few comments on the rock crawler guy. He was towed in with my towbar and dropped by my campsite so the bar would be close. I offered my tools for him to fix his Jeep which he used with some others when I did not have enough stuff. I had no idea he was going to set up camp next to me and stay with us. He caused us no problems but I understand from another neighbor that they lite up a little weed at night. I do not condon that. Problem is he told me he was going to sign up to SS. What do we do if he is a member???

I don't know how we can prevent the curious from riding through our site. I think most of those problems were caused by curious kids checking us out. Laying out the site ahead of time and assigning spots is going to be difficult. I get there early and find a level spot as we sleep in the 813. I try to find a shady spot because my Wife hangs around the truck and reads during the day when I am on the trails.

A set time for trailrides would be great, but someone will have to set them up and be sure they are met. Things happen that delay events from setting off at the set time.

There is lots of room for improvement but someone will have to be in charge of these things. Richard and Mike and several of their helpers commit to the MKT and stay there. I believe carnac has said he will commit to the sign up at the gate.

I guess in my ramblings I am saying yes lets improve, but lets be very careful to not over burden the ones willing to work so as to cause them to drop out. I would love to help more at the MKT but I come for the company and the trailrides. Squirt-truck, I had a ball the hours I spent with you and dumpster on the trails, It don't get no better than that.:driver:
 

wreckerman893

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One of my intentions this year was to bring my old laptop and printer so we could print out menus.

I dropped the ball on that one.

Next year we will have that capability and will post menus on the bulletin board and in the Mess Hall area.

We also plan to put the food in insulated containers and serve it from a table at ground level so folks won't have to negotiate the steps of the MKT and dodge hot ovens.

We are hoping to have a covered dining area with picnic tables so folks can eat and socialize together.
 
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