1. Last weekend was a four-day weekend for most folks. Money was spent and the boss expects you to put in a solid three days of productive time this week.
2. Thursday night was mostly prelims. Portland fans are not going to make a two-hour drive or take PTO, book hotels, etc. for preliminary heats.
3. Be realistic, how many people are going to use the family vacation fund to travel to Eugene, Mt. SAC, Sacramento, Des Moines, Austin, or anywhere else for a track meet? Unless everyone in the house is a track nut, good luck selling your spouse that a week in Eugene, OR beats a week at Disney World, NYC, or a national park.
4. I agree that USATF needs to spread the meet around. The problem is that hardly any other city bids for it nor has the facilities for a championship meet. USATF doesn't pay for this meet - local organizers do.
5. The greatest generation of track fans is either very old or very dead. The sport doesn't enjoy the importance that it once had. A lot of folks will accept a crappy livestream in the comfort of their own home vs. spending thousands to watch it live. The large core of participants in mass running events are not fans of the sport, they are fans of mass events and their own achievements. High school athletes are teenagers that would rather go to someone's summer pool party, drink cheap beer, and make out with someone cute instead of watching a couple of 10K races on their phone.
6. Our national championships should be held in June the weekend following NCAAs. College kids would be closer to their peak fitness and the event might draw some additional spectator interest because of the college athletes.
7. As an alternative, structure the USATF Nationals differently - regional qualifying meets and every event at the nationals is a final. Cut the meet to two days, three days max. Possibly restrict entries to athletes that already have the WCS or are within a small percentage of the WCS. Every race then becomes important and we mostly avoid the weirdness of our national champ not qualifying for Worlds or The Olympics.