Steve Oddo spent many hours working on route
directions. He had made a tape recording (four
hours long!) during his test drive. Steve went
through several revisions, as the published and
sign-posted route was changed after his test
drive. Many EV1 owners had suggestions for
modifications to the route, to avoid other
events planned for the same day, and to make
shortcuts available for those who might be low
on charge. Steve was very flexible and
accommodating. The route changed right up to
takeoff time, and even during the drive as we
encountered heavy traffic, fire engines, and
road construction. We got started late, so we
shortened the route for all to conserve charge
and be sure we got back before dinner.
The route is basically a loop which starts near the
Bay Bridge (small green dot to the northeast of the
end of the bridge) and proceeds counterclockwise
around San Francisco along the route marked in red/yellow.
The start/end was selected to accomodate
charging the 28 EV1's participating.
When I was thinking about how we were going to
keep (more or less) together and keep everyone
on the route, it occurred to me that nearly
everyone has a cell phone, but there would be
chaos if everyone was trying to call Steve Oddo
in the lead car. I got the idea of using a
"meet-me" conference line. I called AT&T, and
discussed the idea. AT&T graciously sponsored
a toll-free conference line that was available
during the entire drive. It was really fun to
hear everyone talking as we went along, to be
able to check on directions from the leaders,
and to hear last-minute route changes. This
conference line helped a lot to keep the
anarchy and confusion somewhat under control,
and made the whole experience more fun.
