2012 cities seek value for money
By Jim Boulden (CNN)
Updated: 2005-07-05 09:17

The five cities wanting to host the 2012 Olympics are highlighting how they will not make the financial mistakes of previous hosts -- the cost overruns, the under used venues, the budget deficits.

London, New York, Madrid, Moscow and Paris all have ideas how to leave a positive legacy after 2012.

U.S. Senator and former first lady Hillary Clinton (L) looks on after joining New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg during a news conference in Singapore July 5, 2005. Hillary joined the New York team in their bid for the 2012 Olympic games, which will be decided by the International Olympic Committee in Singapore on July 6. [Reuters]

When cities put their case forward to host the Olympics they highlight the positive legacy that hosting the games will leave. And many times the local population falls for it.

Anthony Vigor, of the Institute For Public Policy Research, said: "The evidence from past games is actually people have expected the games to deliver benefits and to deliver long-term benefits, and to people and places that needed them.

"But the evidence isn't there that there are long term benefits delivered to those who needed it most."

To be sure, the city gets a makeover: Visitors to Athens and Seoul certainly notice the difference. And Barcelona is now one of Europe's top tourist destinations after the water front was transformed for the 1992 games.

Environmental consultant Roger Levett said: "In Barcelona, they used the Olympics to get the kind of regeneration which they had already decided they wanted.

"The other side of Barcelona, though, they built a grandiose sports park on the outskirts of the city, which is now a ghost city because it really wasn't needed."

And that is the legacy none of the 2012 bidding cities want -- expensive, isolated white elephants stuck out of town.

Athens spends nearly $100 million a year to maintain its 2004 venues. And in Quebec, smokers still pay 17 cents a pack to pay for Olympic construction for the Montreal games of 1976. Other cities have had to wait years to see their stadiums put to good use again.

Take the Olympic stadium in Helsinki, Finland, for example. It was completed in 1938 in time for the 1940 summer games. Those games did not take place because of the war.

But the stadium was put to use when the city was awarded the 1952 games. And this summer, 67 years after it was completed, it will be home to the world athletic championships.

The 2012 bid cities are vowing a cost-effective approach. Paris, for one, will use its existing national stadium, saving hundreds of millions of dollars.

And though London will build a new 80,000-seater stadium, it will use advances in architecture to build it in sections that can easily be removed and stored away.

And both Paris and London will build a host of temporary venues. Many will disappear afterwards, and some will actually be relocated.

Alan Pascoe, Vice Chairman of the The London 2012 Board, said: "With the help of the designers, we will be moving four of the arenas to other parts of the country and five swimming pools. All of which are much needed, because in other parts of the country we are devoid of Olympic-sized swimming pools."

Some cities, like Los Angeles, have actually made a profit from the games, but most have not. And few expect to these days because of the high cost of security and the sheer number of venues needed.

So cities now have to show that the money spent will benefit the area long after the athletics pack up.

Anthony Vigor said: "Its less about white elephants, its more about how you use the construction of the stadium to deliver long-term benefits to the local area, in terms of increasing employment, supply chain, procurement, it being done in an environmentally sustainable way, sets new standards, provides new community facilities."

All five bidding cities promise this after 2012. The International Olympic Committee will decide on July 6 which one might actually pull it off.

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