Olympics 2026 Potential Bid Thread

[CrossedTheTracks]

Originally Posted by Corndogger

It also doesn't hurt that [Los Angeles is] getting some major new sports infrastructure for other purposes. Calgary needs to follow LA's lead if we're going to host another Olympics. Cheaping out will make us look horrible and cost us down the road when our image is downgraded.

I think I agree with you, but maybe not for the reasons you expect.

After some (superficial) research, mostly from https://www.wired.com/story/2028-oly...x-los-angeles/ and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2028_Summer_Olympics, I see that:

• LA figures to spend about $5.3 billion
• They will use largely pre-existing facilities
• A couple significant new facilities were already under construction and would be happening anyway regardless of the Olympics
• The public transit infrastructure spending might get sped up, but these were things they were already planning on doing
• They are considering using stadiums for soccer not just in the Los Angeles area, but also 5 venues in the SF Bay area and San Diego. Apparently without "embarrassment".

Not that Los Angeles's situation is a perfect analogy of Calgary, but seems like a good set of principles to me.

[Corndogger]

Originally Posted by CrossedTheTracks

I think I agree with you, but maybe not for the reasons you expect.

After some (superficial) research, mostly from https://www.wired.com/story/2028-oly...x-los-angeles/ and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2028_Summer_Olympics, I see that:

• LA figures to spend about $5.3 billion
• They will use largely pre-existing facilities
• A couple significant new facilities were already under construction and would be happening anyway regardless of the Olympics
• The public transit infrastructure spending might get sped up, but these were things they were already planning on doing
• They are considering using stadiums for soccer not just in the Los Angeles area, but also 5 venues in the SF Bay area and San Diego. Apparently without "embarrassment".

Not that Los Angeles's situation is a perfect analogy of Calgary, but seems like a good set of principles to me.

Yes, the new stadium for the Rams and Chargers would be built anyway but when it was pitched it was sold as a major venue for the Olympics. No different than the Flames ownership saying a new arena and a new stadium could be used for the Olympics. Banc of California Stadium will be a jewel for soccer even though it would have been built anyway. As for other cities hosting soccer games that is normal. There's way too many games for any city to host all of them. The Coliseum is going to get an extra $300 million worth of renovations because of the Olympics. That's significant. Calgary could easily justify upgrading the oval, ski jumping and stuff at Canmore.

Yeah, most of the transit expansion in L.A. would happen anyway except but one line will be expedited to be done by 2024. If Calgary got a line to the airport or an extension of a line earlier because of holding the Olympics it would be a benefit.

I'm in favor of going for the Olympics but only if we get major benefits and NO sharing of events.

[geotag277]

Originally Posted by sammyd

https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/eco...-olympic-games

There is nothing good about spending Billions of dollars for a 2 week athletic event.

Wow, check out that broadcast rights chart. Calgary in 1988 to Albertville in 1992 was the only time broadcast rights declined in value. It really does seem like Calgary in 1988 was a watershed Winter Olympics event that made the Winter Olympics something interesting for the entire world.

An alternative take on, "is it worth it for the host city", for Vancouver, the answer was yes:

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/news...ticle15036916/

Mainly due to leveraging Federal and Provincial funds. Perhaps Edmonton would be upset, but it's hard to see how people in Calgary would complain about this:

And those projects were largely paid for by the provincial and federal governments. The report states that for every $12 spent by Ottawa and B.C. on the three big projects, local taxpayers contributed only $1.

[ST1]

I agree with SammyD. There's no reason to spend billions for a two week event hosting sports nobody cares about. (other than hockey and figure skating) and with the NHL out, nobody cares about the hockey portion either.

Whether the money comes from the feds or the province it's still taxpayer money.

Originally Posted by geotag277

Wow, check out that broadcast rights chart. Calgary in 1988 to Albertville in 1992 was the only time broadcast rights declined in value. It really does seem like Calgary in 1988 was a watershed Winter Olympics event that made the Winter Olympics something interesting for the entire world.

An alternative take on, "is it worth it for the host city", for Vancouver, the answer was yes:

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/news...ticle15036916/

Mainly due to leveraging Federal and Provincial funds. Perhaps Edmonton would be upset, but it's hard to see how people in Calgary would complain about this:

[ST1]

Originally Posted by sammyd

https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/eco...-olympic-games

There is nothing good about spending Billions of dollars for a 2 week athletic event.

Exactly.

[Rollerstud98]

You really believe the NHL would be out for Olympics in Calgary? I don't agree with sammy although I don't believe they should be given a blank cheque. Just because you don't understand sports doesn't make them a negative.

[White Pine]

I don't think having olympic-ready venues in your city makes it look bad. I would think the opposite. All that needs to happen is some temporary redecorating and an easy wayfinding system between venues (A train to banff? )

Maybe a stadium and an airport transit connection would be nice, but that's about it.

P.S. The whole "wow everyone with new facilities" thing doesn't work anymore. Countries are not bidding because of the prohibitive cost of that kind of thing, and they're practically giving away Olympics due to lack of bidders. It's a smart thing to do to not spend money when there's no reason to, plus people come to watch events, not to see brand new speedskating ovals. Nobody outside of Calgary will care. If they're that worried, they could bring Edmonton in and use Rogers Place as a shiny arena or something. Actually it might be a good idea to split up the hockey a bit.

[geotag277]

Originally Posted by ST1

Whether the money comes from the feds or the province it's still taxpayer money.

Sure, but I'd rather tax payer money be "wasted" in Calgary as opposed to digging and filling in subway stations in Toronto for example.

[WhipperSnapper]

Are you serious? A hole was dug for a station and quickly filled back in 25 years ago in Toronto. Do you really have to go back that far to find an example of waste? What about the $2.5 billion dollar two week circus in 2015 that no one wanted, no one attended and actually cost federal taxpayers money (about $400 million)

Hey, I'm not complaining if Calgary taxpayers with help from the province and, very little from the Feds want to gift the Flames a new arena and stadium for hosting their own 2 week circus.

The impression I get from the support of the games is access to Federal dollars. You'll get some but, you'll be spending a hell of a lot more just for those pennies.

[Rollerstud98]

Originally Posted by WhipperSnapper

Are you serious? A hole was dug for a station and quickly filled back in 25 years ago in Toronto. Do you really have to go back that far to find an example of waste? What about the $2.5 billion dollar two week circus in 2015 that no one wanted, no one attended and actually cost federal taxpayers money (about $400 million)

Hey, I'm not complaining if Calgary taxpayers with help from the province and, very little from the Feds want to gift the Flames a new arena and stadium for hosting their own 2 week circus.

The impression I get from the support of the games is access to Federal dollars. You'll get some but, you'll be spending a hell of a lot more just for those pennies.

As long as the Federal Gov will continue to bail out shithole eastern companies time after time I think they can spare a little for major renos to most venues to bring them up to snuff and a new arena for the City of Calgary.

[Western Spaghetti]

Originally Posted by Rollerstud98

You really believe the NHL would be out for Olympics in Calgary? I don't agree with sammy although I don't believe they should be given a blank cheque. Just because you don't understand sports doesn't make them a negative.

It's not a case of not understanding certain sports that make it a negative. The negative aspect is blatantly obvious., and there are a couple of billion rea$on$.

[Western Spaghetti]

Originally Posted by geotag277

Sure, but I'd rather tax payer money be "wasted" in Calgary as opposed to digging and filling in subway stations in Toronto for example.

I hate when people use this stupid argument to justify spending money. Let's waste money because someone else wasted money.

[Western Spaghetti]

Originally Posted by Rollerstud98

As long as the Federal Gov will continue to bail out shithole eastern companies time after time I think they can spare a little for major renos to most venues to bring them up to snuff and a new arena for the City of Calgary.

I don't like to see the feds spend funds on our money sucking eastern neighbors, but rather than blow more money, let's figure out a way to stop the feds from wasting money altogether.

[geotag277]

Originally Posted by WhipperSnapper

The impression I get from the support of the games is access to Federal dollars. You'll get some but, you'll be spending a hell of a lot more just for those pennies.

I'm sure, just like Vancouver did. BC coughed up about 2-3x what the Feds did, and it was still worth it (for Vancouver).

Your oddly pessimistic outlook on Federal dollars notwithstanding, it wouldn't take very much Federal money to make it a net win for Calgary, and I suspect there is more Federal money on the table than you are pretending. Even if we get a quarter of what Vancouver got (250 million instead of 1 billion), it's hard to see how that couldn't be engineered into a net benefit for Calgary. Keep in mind the IOC is coughing up a billion dollars of their own for this Olympics, unlike in Vancouver, so if we fudge the Federal money with IOC money as one bucket, we're already ahead.

Keep in mind Nenshi has already indicated that if Federal money is completely off the table, the bid is dead. The bid is not dead.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgar...deau-1.3908060

[sammyd]

Originally Posted by geotag277

I'm sure, just like Vancouver did. BC coughed up about 2-3x what the Feds did, and it was still worth it (for Vancouver).

Your oddly pessimistic outlook on Federal dollars notwithstanding, it wouldn't take very much Federal money to make it a net win for Calgary, and I suspect there is more Federal money on the table than you are pretending. Even if we get a quarter of what Vancouver got (250 million instead of 1 billion), it's hard to see how that couldn't be engineered into a net benefit for Calgary. Keep in mind the IOC is coughing up a billion dollars of their own for this Olympics, unlike in Vancouver, so if we fudge the Federal money with IOC money as one bucket, we're already ahead.

Keep in mind Nenshi has already indicated that if Federal money is completely off the table, the bid is dead. The bid is not dead.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgar...deau-1.3908060

There is no net benefit to holding the Olympics.

[geotag277]

Originally Posted by sammyd

There is no net benefit to holding the Olympics.

There is a benefit for the host city, which as a Calgarian, is something I care about:

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/news...ticle15036916/

[jawagord]

Interesting story on Calgary's failed proposal for 2010 Winter Olympics. Love the rendition of the ski jump modifications.

https://sprawlcalgary.com/calgary-20...t-7dbcd2694d96

[sammyd]

Originally Posted by geotag277

There is a benefit for the host city, which as a Calgarian, is something I care about:

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/news...ticle15036916/

nice link there. Real science behind it.

https://arxiv.org/ftp/arxiv/papers/1607/1607.04484.pdf

https://fivethirtyeight.com/features...le-investment/

[geotag277]

Originally Posted by sammyd

nice link there. Real science behind it.

https://arxiv.org/ftp/arxiv/papers/1607/1607.04484.pdf

https://fivethirtyeight.com/features...le-investment/

Yeah, the "science" behind your counterexamples is using summer olympic games (which are more expensive), and things like Sochi - which was an absurd overpriced Russian propaganda corruption show piece.

In reality, the most direct example we can use for *Canadian* winter olympics is 1988 Calgary and 2010 Vancouver. As referenced, these were two good investments for the host cities.

If you have to invoke 50 billion dollar Russian winter games as a counter example, you've lost the plot, and you've lost the argument.

[sammyd]

Originally Posted by geotag277

Yeah, the "science" behind your counterexamples is using summer olympic games (which are more expensive), and things like Sochi - which was an absurd overpriced Russian propaganda corruption show piece.

In reality, the most direct example we can use for *Canadian* winter olympics is 1988 Calgary and 2010 Vancouver. As referenced, these were two good investments for the host cities.

If you have to invoke 50 billion dollar Russian winter games as a counter example, you've lost the plot, and you've lost the argument.

You boil down all the studies done to show these events
as a waste of money to “Sochi” just to fit your narrative. There are ZERO quality studies that agree with you. I’m hoping our elected officials are more intelligent than the average Olympic fanboy.

https://www.google.ca/amp/s/amp.busi...-cities-2015-7

http://www.humanosphere.org/social-b...ntry-can-make/