Are the Olympics on their last legs?
With the exorbitant costs (20-25 billion dollars) to stage the Games and the declining interest are the Olympics long for this world?
With the exorbitant costs (20-25 billion dollars) to stage the Games and the declining interest are the Olympics long for this world?
call me Al
Favorite Answer
You've got a good point. The 2022 Winter Olympics will be held in Beijing because it beat out Almaty (Kazakhstan) -- Oslo and Munich, both favorites, dropped out. This happens frequently: candidate cities invest millions into preparing a bid to host the Olympics (which will cost billions), then abruptly drop out due to costs and demands by the International Olympic Committee. When the circus leaves town, the city is stuck with dozens of structures that, without good planning, will be lightly used but require millions to maintain. It's not a sustainable economic model.
I think what we'll wind up with a small group of cities that repeatedly host the Olympics. This way, the stadiums are used more frequently and fewer new construction will be needed.
Incidentally, the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi cost an estimated $49 billion. But that contains a lot of intentional graft, i.e. Putin vastly overpaying developers who have been useful to him.
Anonymous
In the US, less and less people give a crap each run.
Burgoo
Hopefully
Leafsfan29-Embrace the drought!
No, but you are starting to see some sensibility with respect to cities wanting to host (long term, they should probably go to a 2-3 city rotation for the winter and summer games). Seeing Montreal nearly go bankrupt after the 1976 summer games 'should' have been the canary in the coal mine, but it wasn't. Athens, Sochi and Rio spent billions they didn't have to build facilities that have gone to rot.
Anonymous
Obviously not. Locations have already been selected for the next ten years.