CHARLOTTE, N.C. _ The plan called for hundreds of media members to tour Spectrum Center and the Charlotte Convention Center Wednesday, eyeing work spaces, camera angles and TV suites for this summer's Republican National Convention.
Instead, the GOP's media "walk-through" took place via teleconference.
Republican officials are still moving ahead with plans for an August convention that would bring 50,000 people to Charlotte for the four-day gathering, including at least 1,200 related receptions and other events.
But even with the most careful planning, the COVID-19 pandemic looms as the great disrupter _ one that still could force dramatic changes.
Convention CEO Marcia Lee Kelly told reporters Wednesday that "public safety is paramount," even if delegates have to wear masks and social distance in the arena. Organizers are flexible, she said, but forging ahead.
"Four months from now is like a world, a universe, away," she said. "We are moving full steam ahead to ... a historic convention."
In March, President Donald Trump told Fox News host Sean Hannity that there's "no way" he would cancel the convention. But Democrats, who already moved their convention back from July to August because of the pandemic, are making other contingency plans.
Joe Biden, the party's presumptive presidential nominee, told ABC News that the party "may have to do a virtual convention."
"We may not be able to put 10, 20, 30,000 people in one place, and that's very possible," he said.
Nobody knows exactly what the nation's health situation will look like in late August. Nobody knows when people will feel comfortable gathering in crowds or when N.C. Gov. Roy Cooper, a Democrat, will relax restrictions that limit gatherings to no more than 10 people.
And nobody knows if the convention center might be in use as an emergency, 600-bed field hospital, as county leaders proposed Tuesday.
Convention officials said they're working with state and local leaders as well as the federal Centers for Disease Control and the president's coronavirus task force to ensure a safe convention.
"Our goal is very much to have a convention that is safe for everyone and is a great economic benefit to Charlotte," said Max Everett, the convention's vice president and CIO. "We believe this convention is going to show everyone that Charlotte is open for business again."
But what would a convention look like if it were virtual? Or even nontraditional?
Two words: TV and technology.
Kelly said planners have always envisioned a "made-for-TV" event. But that doesn't necessarily require an arena.
"Much of current conventions can actually be done in a TV production studio," said political scientist Eric Heberlig of UNC Charlotte. "What having it in arenas gives you is the crowds. In an age of social distancing, you're going to lose a lot of that rally aspect. You can't get the crowds as enthusiastic if the arena is half-empty."
The president and other speakers could appear from virtually anywhere, with their patriotic backdrop of choice. State delegations could call in their votes _ and deliver their home state accolades _ on Zoom.
In North Carolina, both Republicans and Democrats have had new experience with virtual conventions at the county and congressional district level.
Kelsey Brown, for example, led this month's 8th District GOP convention from his home in the Montgomery County town of Troy.
"It was pretty simple," he said.
Delegates listened to audio speeches from statewide GOP candidates. After having been credentialed online, they cast their votes for state convention delegates and resolutions on laptops or smart phones.
National conventions, of course, are about more than voting. They're opportunities for parties to showcase their candidates and sell their message to American voters.
Still, Charles Bierbauer, a former CNN journalist and former dean of communications studies at the University of South Carolina, said it may be time to rethink them.
"The pandemic creates the opportunity to say, 'We're going to do it differently," he said. "'We don't need this massive expenditure of time and resources. We're doing everything else virtually, why not that?'"
Jeff Greenfield, a journalist and network TV analyst, said there's been "a kind of low-grade debate for some time that conventions have outlived their usefulness."
"So what the parties lose is the chance to make their case virtually unimpeded," he told the Observer. "On the last night of a convention millions of people tune in to see the nominee being hailed as a conquering hero. ... This (pandemic) is going to force a rethinking of conventions in general."
As conventions have become less about deciding a nominee than crowning one, TV networks have devoted less time to covering them. Greenfield said he could see networks offering a limited prime-time window, maybe one hour on the first nights, two on the final night.
Political scientist Sandy Maisel of Maine's Colby College believes conventions should be a "stand-by mechanism." If a contested race is unresolved after the primaries _ as it once appeared the Democratic contest might be _ then conventions could play a role, whatever their form.
"The conventions as they currently exist serve a very limited role," he said. "So I think a virtual convention can serve that same role. ... to affirm the nomination of the candidate we know is going to be the party's standard bearer and then affirm his choice of vice president."
And there's always the option of shrinking the convention. Weather sliced a day off Republican conventions in 2008 and 2012. The 2012 Democratic convention in Charlotte was a day shorter by design.
For Charlotte, there's the economic impact of the convention to consider. It's expected to bring in more than $100 million.
That benefit would be harder to realize with a virtual convention.
"If it's a virtual convention," Greenfield said, "what does Charlotte or any other city have to do with it at all?"
(Staff writer Tim Funk contributed to this report.)
