Las Vegas turned out to be a great venue for ACE18. Attendance numbers were up and while some skeptics doubted people would actually go to the conference events, exhibit hall traffic seemed busy to me. Unfortunately I had a bid during the show so couldn't go to any papers for the first time in 20 years.... so I can't comment on how well these were attended. I read through the technical program on the flight home to see what I had missed and there were some very interesting sessions on membrane technology and water reuse and overall I think a better balance of technical and management sessions.
One criticism of conferences at Vegas is that delegates disappear down the strip and there are less networking opportunities, but I thought the opposite for ACE18. Because the Mandalay Bay and adjoining Delano Hotel are so big, most functions were held there or at the nearby Luxor, so it was easy to walk from the show to your hotel and back to the functions and even go to a more than one. So for me it was one of the best networking ACE's I have been to. My only criticism of the Mandalay Bay Convention Center was you could not get food in the exhibit hall and lines were very long to get lunch in the Mandalay Bay, so the exhibit Hall was dead during lunchtime when you would hope to get some traffic. That needs to be addressed next time.
I heard a few companies didn't exhibit because they thought attendance would be down due to some city's not being allowed to attend. That may have been the case for some city's but I heard attendance was well up on recent years so it does not seem that too many were restricted from coming. I think it is over 20 years since ACE was at Las Vegas but after the success of ACE18 I am sure it will be a lot sooner before ACE returns. Viva Las Vegas!
