South 40 camping vs. day parking

[Dave Shaver]

Hi all,
First, let me say I really enjoyed OSH this year even with dirtier than expected spot a pots, blowing trash, etc. I have been attending off and on now (average every 3-5 years) for 40 years. Yep first one I was 16 yrs old in 1973 with my Dad.

Now to my gripe, My partner and I landed our Comanche Tuesday about 11:30 local and we taxied most of the way back to Fond du Lac to park. In fact, the marshaller came over and welcomed us to Fond du Lac and we all had a good laugh! That's OK, we came when it appeared to be rather full. BUT, that evening about 30-40% of the planes that came in that day left! They were day parkers. We were camping for at least 3 days and had our VAC sign in the window as soon as we came off 36L. What that did is put us way out in the middle of nowhere south of the last access road/guard shack for the rest of our stay. In fact, we remained the last row with just a couple of planes down there. Didn't want to break camp to move closer and it would probably have been a hassle with the ground crew anyway.

Here is my suggestion, If a VAC or ? sign is not displayed have the volunteers (who are great BTW), park them as far south as possible in the new property and move the lines northward. Let us campers park up together where we are a little more in touch with the OSH world. The marshallers could even go over and ask them their intentions (ie day park, show park, etc.) Besides, I know as campers we spend a H*** of a lot more money there than the day parkers do so I would think that would warrant paying us a little extra attention.

OK, I got that off my chest, and I'm probably coming back in 2014. Wife says she wants to see it again. She has a non current PPL and hasn't been there in over 20 yrs.

And to just confirm, I really appreciate all that is accomplished all year long to make it happen for one week a year. And the volunteers, THEY ARE THE BEST! Hope to join them someday when I retire!

Dave Shaver
PA24 260 N8842P

[FlyingRon]

I'm one of those guys who park the planes down in Vintage (not in any position of authority, but I was Volunteer of the Year this year). This is a battle I've been fighting for years. They reserve prime spots for the non-campers. The argument I'm always given is that people want to look at airplanes and not tents. Frankly, it's a bit illusory of an argument to me. I not only want to see planes, but talk to the pilots and a pilot is more likely to be at the camp sites. Feel free to gripe to the vintage committee people.

Note that non-camping spaces aren't necessarily "day parkers" but often are people staying elsewhere (dorms, Scholler, etc...). We usually run out of close in parking spaces too.

We do try our best to back fill spaces up front (including the ones across the road between the Theater In The Woods and the Hangar Cafe. I regularly have little snippets of paper with the list of available spaces to backfill. Compounding the problem is the new TSA-mandated security perimeter road chewed off a lot of the parking spaces and a chunk of the Ultralight area. On the otherhand, the banishing of Zaugs meant the judges could move into the old Zaugs trailer and the deteriorating judges trailers were hauled off and we got one more row of parking back there.

Of course the only guarantee is to just get there early (someone came up to me and asked how they could get a good spot, and I pointed out that I was there since the previous Wednesday. Back in the old days I'd usually end up somewhere around the end of the ultralight runway.

If it were up to me, I'd do away with the preferred parking rows (other than for the special exhibit/past grands).

[Dave Shaver]

Hi FlyingRon, Congratulations on Volunteer of the year! Quite an accomplishment! Guess your name is Ron. Its why I always use my real name, so we all get to know each other. Anyway, thanks for your response. I don't have a clue to the politics of it all but I bet you guys see a bunch of it. I will just add that I have no problem with folks parking then staying somewhere else in the area. Probably what I will do next year with my wife. The planes that left that day came in just ahead of us and left that day. Spoke to some campers around us and they agreed that the ones that left the rows ahead of us had come in with them earlier in the day. Dave