The Sixth Annual Conference on Advances in Cognitive Systems will run from Saturday, August 18, to Monday, August 20, 2018, at Stanford University in the San Francisco Bay area. The meeting will start at 9:00 AM on the first day and end by 5:30 PM on the third day.
The event will take place in the Li Ka Shing Conference Center at Stanford's School of Medicine. The Center is located at 291 Campus Drive, Stanford, CA 94305 on the northwest side of campus. Additional directions, including parking information, are available here.
The registration fee for the conference is $260 before midnight Pacific time on Tuesday, July 31, 2018, and $300 on Wednesday, August 1, and later. The same fee applies to students and nonstudents. To register, please complete the online registration form and pay with a credit card or a PayPal account.
There are a number of hotels and motels within short driving distance from the Li Ka Shing Center, but none that are within convenient walking distance. Lodging in the area is generally expensive, so you may want to shop around or consider booking a room through Airbnb. You can find some nearby options here, but prices can drop with distance from campus, and it may be cost effective to consider places further away.
If you are a non-local participant, you will probably fly into either the San Jose Airport (SJC) or the San Francisco Airport (SFO). There are a number of options for getting from the airports to the Stanford area and back again. Lyft and Uber rides from SJC are approximately $30 and $35, respectively. The corresponding prices from SFO are approximately $45 and $50, although these will vary with demand and estimated travel time.
If you rent a car at either the San Jose or San Francisco airports, you can take either US 101 or Interstate 280 to reach the Stanford area. Driving directions to the Li Ka Shing Conference Center, including parking information, are available here.
Parking at Stanford is free on the weekends in A and C lots, but you must pay for parking on weekdays on an hourly basis, as described here. Even if you rent a car, you may want to consider booking a Lyft or Uber on Monday, August 20, or riding the Marguerite Shuttle if you are near one of its stops. The Marguerite does not run on weekends.
Car rental services are available at the San Francisco and San Jose Airports and at several locations in Palo Alto, including:
Weekend rates between August 17 and August 20 range from $53 to $62 per day at San Francisco Airport and from $50 to $60 per day at San Jose Airport, depending on the model. Online reservations typically result in lower costs, with Expedia and sites for both SFO and SJC providing useful price comparisons.
Shuttles are available at both San Francisco and San Jose Airports, with signs leading you to the shuttle pick up areas from baggage claim. Taxis and Lyft/Uber stops are available in the same vicinity.
