[AlvinofDiaspar]

But how are we supposed to have a debate leading up to Sep 15 if everyone hasn't already made up their minds?

Think of the deadline for the letter as saving a seat at the table instead of deciding what to order, much less paying the bill.

AoD

 

[toforumer]

If Los Angeles enters the race as a replacement, Toronto will still be able to handle their own. I have no doubt Toronto will have the strongest bid on paper just like 2008. This time there is no Beijing just Paris and Rome. Los Angeles just recently had a Summer Olympics in 1984 and if they get 2024, this will be their third time hosting. No way in hell this happens. Paris and Rome have hosted as well but not so recent as LA.

Let's say these are the bidding cities by deadline: Toronto, Paris, Rome, Hamburg, Budapest, Los Angeles, Baku

The shortlist will definitely include 5 cities: Toronto, Paris, Rome, Hamburg, Los Angeles

My two cents on the voting with this crop of candidates:
Vote splitting between the 3 European candidates will be prominent through each round. The USA should have an early exit, first round exit once again. There was a reason why they passed on LA the first time, now submitting them in once their Boston bid and USOC were in shambles. Hosting in 1984 won't help. Toronto will benefit by getting atleast 90-95% of Los Angeles's voters in the next round. The vote splitting between Paris, Rome and Hamburg will help Toronto push forward to a final ballot vs. either Paris or Rome.

 

[TheTigerMaster]

I'm thinking we'll lose to Paris. The 100th anniversary angle plus the IOC European bias will make Paris tough to beat, even if we do have a stronger bid on paper.

 

[Tewder]

They were just in London, like two hours from Paris. North America's turn?

 

[TOperson]

I wonder where Paris would site all the Olympic stuff. On the outskirts, I assume. Anyone know what their bid looks like?

 

[Kitsune]

For Paris - everything already built or temp venues in iconic locations. All they require is a Aquatics Centre for Swimming & Diving and an Olympic Village. The IOC won't care about the 100 years since Paris 1924. Its likely at the very least Hamburg votes will go to eithier Toronto or LA (which could have a very very similiar bid to Paris) in hopes of a Berlin 2028 bid. For Italy, those votes are a bit of a wildcard.

 

[salsa]

I wonder where Paris would site all the Olympic stuff. On the outskirts, I assume. Anyone know what their bid looks like?

No they will raze entire neighbourhoods and displace thousands of people, just like in Toronto. Am I right?

 

[djthomps]

No they will raze entire neighbourhoods and displace thousands of people, just like in Toronto. Am I right?

Neither Toronto's bid in 1996, 2008 nor the recent Pan Ams included razing of neighbourhoods. What would lead you to this fallacious assumption for 2024? Nothing! Just more unfounded rhetoric from the no camp.

 

[The Golem]

Quite the opposite. An Olympics village for the athletes would be another, and larger opportunity than Pan Am to develop neglected space with a massive housing project.

Besides, Toronto doesn't need the Olympics to "raze area and displace" residents. That's happening now and will continue to occur.
http://www.thestar.com/opinion/comm...s_leading_to_displacement_in_regent_park.html

 

[animatronic]

http://news.nationalpost.com/toront...th-olympic-fever-is-fertile-soil-for-nonsense

 

[AlvinofDiaspar]

Incidentally, he also said:

If the Pan Am Games do nothing else for this city, it is to be hoped some of us might notice that at long last, and not without hiccups and massive expenditure, we are knocking the downtown renewal file out of the park. Wandering around the teeming Distillery District on Sunday, even the grumpy and gridlock-bound would have been hard pressed not to concede we have something spectacular on our hands there. From there to Corus Quay to Sugar Beach to Queen’s Quay West, we are reaping the benefits of decades of political toil and spending.

http://news.nationalpost.com/toront...nt-has-come-a-long-way-even-cynics-must-agree

You need look no further than the Pan Am Games for proof we can grab the bull by the horns when we need to: we decided certain people needed reliable vehicular transportation across the GTA, so we created temporary high-occupancy lanes. Many howled, some cheated, and many adapted: Metrolinx reported a surge in usage of its online carpooling service; others used Uber’s timely new carpooling app. Were we to keep those HOV lanes, those options would remain available to all of us. And if we finally admitted what all the research shows — that only pricing everyone’s road usage fights gridlock — we could start tackling this tomorrow.

http://news.nationalpost.com/toront...k-local-when-many-major-problems-are-regional

And you should definitely re-read the commentary by said author in the article "Will we be prepared for Pan Am?" back in November 11, 2009 in the same paper. I will leave this quote:

As for the games themselves, I'm not the first to suggest selling them to Torontonians is going to be a damn sight harder than selling the bid. Toronto's not the greatest major-league sports town, and it's a downright awful minor-league sports town. (Our inferiority complex is exceeded only by our too-cool-for-school complex. No wonder we're so emotionally fragile.)

Still, this city absolutely needs to get more ambitious --for its own citizens' sake -- and the pace of events here has simply got to quicken. If it takes the fear of pan-hemispheric embarrassment to make our municipal politicians snap to, then so be it. There's not much games skeptics can do about them now, anyway. They're coming. Might as well hope for the best

I think we can look back and say that the games did exactly what it was supposed to do, and in a way that's probably a bit better than we thought - to our surprise. That is well worth the price of admission, and the job is only half done.

AoD

 

[sixrings]

I can't stand conservative papers calling Olympic advocates urban elite lefties while at the same time justifying hybrid highways and subways to scarborough. Maybe not the writer of the article but the comment section. Plus I'm sure there are some liberals who support the subway and are against the olympics. Just as there has to be some conservatives who think all of this is a waste of money.

 

[AlvinofDiaspar]

I can't stand conservative papers calling Olympic advocates urban elite lefties while at the same time justifying hybrid highways and subways to scarborough. Maybe not the writer of the article but the comment section. Plus I'm sure there are some liberals who support the subway and are against the olympics. Just as there has to be some conservatives who think all of this is a waste of money.

That comments section of any paper/news channels tend to be a cesspool. I think you'd find a mix of opinions on the Olympics amongst the general population.

AoD

 

[sixrings]

Agreed it isn't a left or right issue. But people want to make every issue a left right issue.

 

[salsa]

Neither Toronto's bid in 1996, 2008 nor the recent Pan Ams included razing of neighbourhoods. What would lead you to this fallacious assumption for 2024? Nothing! Just more unfounded rhetoric from the no camp.

I wasn't being serious. You should be talking to this guy:

The Olympics are not going to re-use more than a few minor Pan Am sites. The Olympics are a real-estate scam, so what'll happen is, whole neighbourhoods will be scraped away, and Ontario Place and the Exhibition buildings will be demolished, all for new Olympic sites. And that's just for starters. We'll be lucky to keep Rouge Park intact.

Anyway, how much of which Toronto parks are you willing to give up for the games? While we're at it, which neighbourhoods are you willing to displace?

Hosting the Olympics means displacing neighbourhoods.

http://www.bostonagainstolympics.bid/why-oppose/housing-and-displacement/

You don't think it's coincidence that Olympic bids are backed by the development industry, do you?

But now I see that AoD thinks expropriation of private property is OK. So great! Let's talk about which neighbourhoods we are willing to sacrifice to the Olympics.

Hosting the games would mean displacing hundreds, possibly thousands, of homes and businesses. Which is exactly what has happened in every host city.

LOL, haven't you noticed that the Olympics always involve levelling pre-existing neighbourhoods? The Olympics never just make do with whatever spaces happen to be readily available.

Let's talk about which neighbourhoods we are willing to sacrifice to build Olympic venues.

Edit: digging out all this crap (which is only a small sample of it) reminds me how obnoxious this poster is. Time to use the ignore list.