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- Thread starter Southcore
- Start date
Tuscani01
Senior Member
Is that the fault of the Olympics, or Brasil?
Brasil is facing corruption, crime, poverty and many other social issues that are significantly affecting the ability of the organizing committee to implement their plan. This is driving up costs significantly. These are issues the IOC will not need to worry about with Toronto.
AlvinofDiaspar
Moderator
Oh I agree. I would definitely consider those fair costs attributable to the games.
AoD
AlvinofDiaspar
Moderator
Actually I would say they've mismanaged it (like Athens) - they chose to do nothing after winning the bid, and then had this mad dash to the finish line a year or two before the games. London didn't do that. Toronto didn't do that - and if we get the games, you bet we will need some kind of ODA equivalent.
AoD
salsa
Senior Member
Haha sure. A Toronto Olympics will be a disaster just like Rio.
Here are the 4 Challenges Rio de Janeiro Must Meet to Host a Successful 2016 Olympics
Antonio Lacerda–EPA A young man rests next to a destroyed house at the shanty town Vila Autodromo, which is located close to the Olympic Park built for the Olympic Games Rio 2016, in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, on 01 April 2015.
With fewer than 500 days to go before the next Summer Games Rio faces great problems including crime, pollution and energy
The countdown is on until the 2016 Olympics and Rio de Janeiro is preparing to welcome millions of people from around the world. But in order to succeed as hosts, the Brazilian city — which won the bid to host the Summer Games back in 2009 — must address the social tensions, environmental problems and water crises that threaten to marr the biggests sporting event in the world. Here are four of the main challenges Rio must tackle before the Opening Ceremony.
1. Pollution in Rio’s Guanabara Bay
Guanabara Bay borders Rio de Janeiro’s east side and is the host site for the Olympic’s sailing and windsurfing events. It’s also made international headlines due to its polluted waters, filled with raw sewage and massive amounts of garbage. While part of Rio’s Olympic bid included a promise to clean up the bay by 80 percent, the state environment secretary, Andre Correa, admitted in January that it would not be possible. They’re currently at 49% of their cleanup goal.
Mario Moscatelli, a biologist and outspoken bay advocate, says the state has the technology, time and money to make significant improvements but that politicians are not interested in making it a priority. He believes they never intended to fulfill this promise and tells TIME they “simply lied” to get the Olympic bid.
Mayor Eduardo Paes told CNN last June that pollution doesn’t pose any health risks for the athletes, but Moscatelli thinks otherwise, claiming that sailing in the bay is “like playing Russian roulette.”
“Sailors run the risk of hitting anything from plastic bags to a car bumper, pieces of wood, tires and even furniture,” he warns. “Falling in the water, the sailors could potentially be victims of gastrointestinal infections, mycoses, otitis or hepatitis.”
2. The water and energy crisis
Brazil is suffering from the worst drought in 40 years. The southeastern city of São Paulo has started rationing water and Rio could be next. Making matters worse, Brazil gets about 70 percent of its energy from hydropower. In Brazil, water crisis equals an energy crisis.
The Minister of Mines and Energy, Eduardo Braga, also made a frightening announcement last week: the turbines on Brazil’s principal hydroelectric plants will stop running if water levels dip below 10% capacity. They’re currently at 17%.
According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, the Brazilian government spent $5 billion to subsidize fossil fuels to make up for lost hydroelectric power in the lead up to the 2014 World Cup and may have to do so again for the Olympics.
3. Olympic development is raising social tension
In the informal settlements known as favelas, about 8,000 families have been, or are at risk of, removal from their homes for construction linked to the Olympics and the World Cup, according to a 2014 study done by an activist group, the Popular Committee. While the government has been praised for promising market-rate compensation for those evicted, in practice it seems there is no standard price per square foot. A recent study by MIT reported that government officials go from house to house and negotiate behind closed doors. Residents think this is both an intimidation tactic and has sparked rumors of how much people are receiving.
Meanwhile, the “Olympic Legacy” in Rio has been criticized for serving mostly the interests of the private sector and the wealthy. Olympic sites like the golf course and the Olympic Village will be handed over to private construction firms who plan to build luxury apartments, made possible through a financial model known as Private-Public Partnerships (PPP). PPPs mean that private construction firms are footing 60 percent of the bill for Olympic construction projects. While it saves public money, the construction firms are then able to develop the land for profit. Another report by the Popular Committee describes the PPP model as “the eviction of a low-income community, that the city of Rio has made their priority to remove in order to make room for yet another commercialized project.”
Professor Mauro Kleiman, an urban studies professor at the Federal University of Rio, agrees that the legacy will primarily serve private interests, excluding public transportation projects like the extension of the metro and rapid transit bus lines. “The legacy is [in] the interests of real estate development and the tourism sector,” Kleiman tells TIME. “So far, we’re seeing inflated costs, similar to in Greece [where the 2004 Olympics were held in Athens].”
4. Street crime and public security
While street crime has generally fallen over the last 30 years, Rio has seen a spike in street robberies in recent months, reaching levels not seen since 1991.
In March alone there were seven mass robberies, known as arrastões, in public spaces. Armed robbers assaulted commuters twice in the metro and another group of armed criminals closed off a major tunnel and robbed the stopped cars.
A representative from the Rio State Security Secretary said they are responding by increasing police presence in strategic points throughout the city and pointed out that the city of Rio has held major events like the World Cup and Pope Francis’ visit with no major security incidents.
diminutive
Active Member
This logic doesn't make any sense: Toronto has a history of questionable spending decisions, therefore we should spend billions of dollars on a party.
AlvinofDiaspar said:
Most of the infrastructure connected to our 2008 Bid was built anyways, sans-Olympics. The only difference is that without the veneer of the Games, it became pretty obvious that some of those priorities (e.g. UPx) really didn't make that much sense in light of other infrastructure gaps. And, in the last decade, Toronto's seen well over 12billion in infrastructure investment anyways, with dozens of billions more planned for the future (ECLRT, TYSSE, Streetcars + barns, TRs + ATC, Union Station (GO), Union Station (TTC), UPX/Georgetown South, and various station improvement projects). That's WAY more than what Vancouver got out of 2010.
Waterfront Revitalization is also unfolding in a very satisfying manner without the Olympics. For instance, the games would have seen a big chunk of the Portlands converted into sterile sports venues. We love to make fun of the Fords for their ferris wheel suggestion, but would a gaudy, oversized and underused sports arena designed by Zaha Hadid be any different? I'm happy the Portlands is being planned as a normal area of the city as opposed to a collection of gargantuan sports stadia.
Opposition to the Olympics (and other forms of sports-development like the World Cup, subsidized NFL/NHL/MLB/NBA stadiums) is usually because those events have a proven track record of being a waste of money. Philip Porter, an economist at the University of South Florida who has studied the impact of sporting events, told me that the evidence was unequivocal. “The bottom line is, every time we’ve looked — dozens of scholars, dozens of times — we find no real change in economic activity,” he said.
Filip
Senior Member
I'd rather have sterile sports venues (and God be willing a Zaha Hadid-designed stadium) than another condo cluster****.
Do some of you have any imagination? Cities aren't supposed to be bedroom communities.
Do some of you have any imagination? Cities aren't supposed to be bedroom communities.
salsa
Senior Member
Then why do you live in a condo cluster**** (Humber Bay)?
Filip
Senior Member
I LIVE IN THE BLOODY SUBURBS FOR A REASON!
AlvinofDiaspar
Moderator
Actually none of that had much, if anything to do with the 2008 bid - they came way after. The only piece of transit project that is remotely related to the Olympics is some kind of train service running between Exhibition, Union and a new Cherry St. Station.
Note that nothing had been done at the Portlands other than planning work 15 years after the bid (and there is still no firm commitment to actually do it, even now). Not that I dislike those plans or would want to see then torn up, but it's a fact that the Olympics in 08 would have moved that file to the front. The only thing permanent in 08 bid was a stadium downscaled to what, 20K and the aquatics centre - the rest will basically be redeveloped. In fact, one can argue that we are precisely in a position to host the games because we have done all this planning, what we now need is something to commit the governments to implementing these plans instead of humming and haaaing and trying to weasel their way out of it.
AoD
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diminutive
Active Member
Cities aren't for people to live and work and play in, they're for pointless accretions of starchitect ego and elite hubris. I'm glad the Beijing school of Olympic construction is so in vogue here.
Filip
Senior Member
They're for everything. For living, for working, for playing, for grand urban gestures, for sports complexes, etc...
As a city, you are only limited by your narrow-mindedness. Toronto is part of this group (sadly).
As a city, you are only limited by your narrow-mindedness. Toronto is part of this group (sadly).
AlvinofDiaspar
Moderator
Cities are both places for people to work, live and play as well as striving for bigger things (you may call it ego or hubris, but great things and inspirations often requires that - say if Toronto didn't have a sense of hubris, we wouldn't have built the CN Tower; if Sydney didn't have a sense of ego, it wouldn't have built the Opera House, which went 14x overbudget). It's all about balance. No one here is sincerely suggesting we follow the footsteps of Beijing and Sochi.
AoD
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picard102
Senior Member
Well then I guess throw all the money into the fire so we can have a new stadium and some parks. That will show them who's boss.
Tuscani01
Senior Member
Pretty sure these are posted on all of the Welcome to Toronto signs when you enter the city:
