New York Is Lucky Not to Have the Games

Are the Olympics More Trouble than They’re Worth?

The New York Times

April 3, 2012 4:19 PM

Britain last hosted the summer Olympics in 1948, just after World War II when the country was broke and its aspirations were low. The Stadium was dominated by a quote from the founder of the modern Olympics, Baron Pierre de Coubertin: “The important thing in the Olympic Games is not winning but taking part. The essential thing in life is not conquering but fighting well.” This time around, Londoners can do more than take part: they can win.

But as London prepares for the 2012 Games this summer, residents have plenty of doubts: Will it be too expensive? Will it disrupt life too much? In the end, will they be better off because of the Games, or just burdened with public debt and a velodrome no one knows what to do with?

The Games Hurt Londoners

Julian Cheyne is a former tenant of the Clays Lane estate, which was demolished to make way for the London Olympics.

Once the athletes have departed, London is likely to find that tourism has declined and that the Olympic stadiums are of limited public use, even as local sports facilities continue to close. Proponents say the Games will get Britons involved in sport, but we’re more likely to end up with a population even more obese than it was before the five-ring circus came to town.

The hundreds of millions of pounds taken from funds for the arts, children’s and community sports will not be returned. Instead, the budget — by some calculations already £24 billion — will expand with post-Olympics spending.

Britain will have moved further down the road to “demautocracy,” in which politicians unite to dismiss any disagreement as unpatriotic and in which extraordinary security measures, like installing video surveillance and electric fencing, are considered normal. Parks adjusted for the Games will have suffered serious damage. And let’s not forget the many Games promoters, politicians and members of the Olympic “family” who will travel in special traffic lanes and will be provided with luxury accommodation at public expense, at a time when vulnerable Britons face cuts.

Moreover, quite a few people have their doubts about the very nature of the Olympics. It’s an open secret that the Games have turned unethical: the Olympic brand is associated with corporations accused of criminality; a circus of elite athletes is used to develop sports consumerism.

New York Is Lucky Not to Have the Games

Mitchell L. Moss, the director of the Rudin Center for Transportation and the Henry Hart Rice professor of urban policy and planning at New York University’s Wagner School of Public Service, is the author of "How New York City Won the Olympics."

New York, which competed unsuccessfully for the 2012 Olympics, may well turn out to be the big winner this summer. Thousands of Londoners intend to flee their homes, and non-Olympic tourists plan to avoid Britain, rather than endure Internet slowdowns, Olympic-generated traffic jams, rocketing hotel prices and airport delays caused by airspace restrictions throughout the 2012 Games.

The true competition this summer is between a free and open New York City — where new pedestrian plazas are jammed with visitors and theaters are open seven days a week. New York relies on its civilian-controlled police department to maintain safety, while Britain is preparing a military deployment and private security forces along with drones in the sky and an aircraft carrier on the Thames River. In fact, as The Guardian notes, there will be more British troops amassed in London (about 13,500) “than are currently at war in Afghanistan."

The London Department for Transport is already urging local residents to avoid the subway, to work from home and to even go to a pub before taking the subway home from work. And hotel rooms during early August are available for only 14-day stays, often with a severe price increase — another turn-off for the typical global tourist lacking a passion for athletic competition. In order to make sure the athletes are not stuck in traffic, an extensive Olympic road network has been designated for the exclusive use of the athletes, corporate sponsors, media, V.I.P.s and Olympic officials. All non-emergency vehicles are banned from this network, including ambulances carrying blood supplies and non-critical patients.

Let the games begin: New York's high-energy, sidewalk fashion show, and spontaneous flow of people all day and night would win the gold medal for urban life — with or without the Olympics.

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