[Bill Cummings]

Hawks,
Please nominate flying sites that you feel are your most “Favorite Flying Sites.” Sites that you feel are an absolute must for pilots to visit, if they want to experience the best that the sport of hang gliding has to offer.

We can then try another test vote, that will enable pilots’ browsing the US Hawks website, some guidance for selecting their next vacation flying site destination.

Also important, this “Voting Test #2” will be a work in progress with suggestions from the US Hawks on how to set up the best nominating and voting procedures.

Guidelines for this nomination process are not cast in concrete. Along with your nomination of “Favorite Flying Sites,” feel free to offer any suggestion on how this process should be set up to do things correctly.

Guidelines/(Rules) for nominating, “Favorite Flying Sites”:
1) Nomination period will close 23:59:59/UTC, Tuesday, May 14, 2013;
2) No limit on sites nominated; (We will probably end up voting on the best 5);
3) To nominate, just hit ”reply” to the post "Voting Test #2: Favorite Flying Sites";
4) The voting ballot on the nominated sites will run for one week from May 15, 2013, 0000/UTC to May 21, 2013, 23:59:59.
5) Each US Hawk member can only vote once, though your vote can be changed
at any point during the voting window. However, the last vote a member enters, will be the vote that is counted.

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UPDATE as of May 15th, 2013 (around 10:10am Pacific Time)
    by Bob Kuczewski under the direction of Bill Cummings
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This is the official list of candidates for the 2nd US Hawks Trial Vote titled "Favorite Flying Sites":

0 - Other (a choice not on the list of choices) - If "Other" wins, then the nominations will be reopened to allow more options.
1 - Torrey Pines
2 - Crestline
3 - Sylmar
4 - Fort Funston
5 - Henson's Gap
6 - Dockweiler Beach
7 - Chelan Butte, WA
8 - Crawford Mts., Randolph, UT
9 - Frontenac Ridge, Frontenac, MN
10 - Lookout Mountain, GA/TN
11 - Maiden Rock, WI
12 - Mingus Mt., Cottonwood, AZ
13 - Dry Canyon, Alamogordo, NM
14 - Point of the Mountain, Draper, UT
15 - Wallaby Ranch, FL
16 - Lanzarote, Canary Islands
17 - Iquique, Chile
18 - Mt Seven, Golden, BC, Canada
19 - Eagleville, California, USA
20 - Cape Jervais, Australia
21 - Magazine Mountain, AR
22 - Villa Grove, CO
23 - Humble home-roof launch place
24 - BASE hang gliding sites: Eiffel Tower
25 - Soar the lift of a long fence
26 - Local steep streets
27 - Empire State Building
28 - Some cemeteries
29 - Sites of historic hang glider flights
30 - Wasserkuppe
31 - Zapata, Tx
32 - Soboba CA
33 - Cape Lookout on the north Oregon coast
34 - Bald Butte in the upper Hood River valley just north of Mt Hood
35 - Ellenville NY

Voting Instructions:

• Please vote by listing the NUMBERS of your choices in the order that you prefer them with your most favorite first and your least favorite last. Use at least one space between your choices (no spaces between the digits within a choice).
• Use the [vote] and [/vote] tags to surround your list like this:
      [vote] 17 11 5 32 1 [/vote]
  The "vote" tags around your list will make it stand out like this:
        17 11 5 32 1  
• You may use an equal sign between any choices to indicate that you don't have a preference between them:
      [vote] 17 11=5 32 1 [/vote]
• You don't have to list all choices in your vote. Any choices that you do not list in your vote will be counted as if they were all equal as your last choice.
• A choice of 0 (zero) can be thought of as "other not listed". So if you wanted 17 first, 11 second, and a choice not on the list as third, then you might vote like this:
      [vote] 17 11 0 5 32 1 [/vote]
• The forum will allow you to edit your post for up to an hour. You may change your vote directly during that time by editing your post. If you change your mind after that, you may simply make another post containing another vote. Only the last ballot cast by each voter before the close of voting will be counted.
• If you have any questions or comments or would like to lobby for (or against) any choices, please feel free to post your thoughts in this topic. This voting system is a process that should help us make better decisions. Communication is part of that process.
• The Chairman for this topic and vote is Bill Cummings and his decisions will be final (although you're welcome to argue your case as long as you like).
• The final results will be posted as an update to this first topic when the election is complete.
• Remember, this voting system allows you to list your choices in the order that YOU prefer them. You don't have to worry about trying to decide which ones are likely to win or lose. Your vote will be counted as if there's a run-off between each set of candidates, so you can't "waste" your vote by picking an unpopular candidate first. If you're not sure what this means, please feel free to ask questions in this topic.

Happy Voting!!

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UPDATE as of May 15th, 2013 (around 3:03pm Pacific Time)
    I added Option Zero (0) which ... if it wins ... means we should reopen nominations.
    We should always have a "none of the above" option on every vote, and I apologize
    to Bill for forgetting to add it. That was my job, and I'm sorry I forgot!!
        Bob Kuczewski
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UPDATE as of May 16th, 2013 (around 9:40am Pacific Time)
    Slight clarification of option "Zero" - changed wording and description from "None" to "Other"
        Bob Kuczewski
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FINAL UPDATE January 6th, 2014

    The US Hawks Favorite Flying Sites fpr 2013 are:

      Lookout Mountain, GA/TN   (nomination #10)
      Local steep streets   (nomination #26)
      Fort Funston, CA   (nomination #4)
      Chelan Butte, WA   (nomination #7)
      Torrey Pines, CA   (nomination #1)
      Zapata, TX   (nomination #31)

[Bob Kuczewski]

Bill, I would support you for chairman any time!!     

Your instructions are clear, concise, and fair.

I'd like to nominate the following sites as Voting Test #2 Favorite Flying Sites:

•   Torrey Pines  
•   Crestline  
•   Sylmar  
•   Fort Funston  
•   Henson's Gap  
•   Dockweiler Beach  

[Bill Cummings]

I'd like to nominate the following sites as Voting Test #2 Favorite Flying Sites:

  Chelan Butte, WA  

  Crawford Mts., Randolph, UT  

  Frontenac Ridge, Frontenac, MN  

  Look Out Mt., GA  

  Henson’s Gap, TN  

  Maiden Rock, WI  

  Mingus Mt., Cottonwood, AZ  

  Dry Canyon, Alamogordo, NM  

  Point of the Mountain, Draper, UT  

[Bob Kuczewski]

Ooops, I forgot to add:

•   Wallaby Ranch, FL  

If you haven't been there, it's like Disney World for hang glider pilots. They have camping, and a pool, and a climbing wall, and a great mess hall, and trees with swings, and cottages, and acres of landing areas, and hangars full of flying stuff everywhere. It's really an amazing place!!

Bill, you've listed some great sites as well. I've been to Point of the Mountain and the Crawfords, and they're great.

This is going to be a tough vote!!!!

[Rodger]

Favorite Flying Sites:

1)   Lanzarote, Canary Islands  
2)   Iquique, Chile  
3)   Mt Seven, Golden, BC, Canada  
4)   Eagleville, California, USA  
5)   Cape Jervais, Australia  

[Bob Kuczewski]

1) Lanzarote, Canary Islands
2) Iquique, Chile
3) Mt Seven, Golden, BC, Canada
4) Eagleville, California, USA
5) Cape Jervais, Australia

We might need some maps, descriptions, and pictures to evaluate those sites!!   

[skydog]

No doubt about what I choose as my number one, non-tow operation, foot launch site...but the rest are important to me, too, and should be experienced by those who seek the best of our community.

1.   Chelan Butte, WA  
2.   Magazine Mountain, AR  
3.   Villa Grove, CO  
4.   Lookout Mountain, TN  
5.   Point of the Mountain, Draper, UT   (or what's left of it!)

[JoeF]

Are we in the nomination period or the voting period on this experiment?

Nominating still:
==   Dockweiler Flight Training Park.   Fly the history. Master the mini-slope soaring. Try to make it to the wet sand. Experience many launches and landings in a short period of time.
==   Humble home-roof launch place.  
==   BASE hang gliding sites: Eiffel Tower  
==   Soar the lift of a long fence.   Reagan: "Cristo, would you knock that Running Fence up ahead!"
==   Local steep streets   in town with traffic stopped for the hang gliding efforts ...
==   Empire State Building   launch; land in Central Park.
==   Some cemeteries.   E.g., site of the 1971 revolutionizing Otto Meet in Newport Beach. Honor those buried. Show the way from grave to sky in their honor.
==   Sites of historic hang glider flights   ...
=====   Wasserkuppe  

== Wasserkuppe flying a replica of the Pelzner Hang

[Bob Kuczewski]

Are we in the nomination period or the voting period on this experiment?

According to Bill's instructions (thanks Bill!!), the nominations will be open until just before midnight on May 14th:

1) Nomination period will close 23:59:59/UTC, Tuesday, May 14, 2013;

Thanks Joe for the great pictures. I especially like this one of Frank with his Skysail prototype and the Otto Meet marker stone.   

gliding1-web.jpg (19.01 KiB) Viewed 9229 times

For anyone who didn't follow the history of that stone, much of it can be found in the "Otto Site Marker" sub-forum. Frank chaired the group that drafted the wording and had the stone made and installed. Thanks Frank!!  

[Bob Kuczewski]

By the way, this topic will present an interesting challenge to the proposed voting system. It looks like we're going to have a long list to choose from, and it would normally be difficult to slim down such a list in this kind of committee environment. So we'll get to see how well the proposed system will work with this many diverse suggestions.

Stay tuned ...