Trying not to let Olympics go to waste
(Agencies)
Updated: 2004-12-10 16:19

Here is nothing emptier than an Olympic arena the day after the flame is extinguished. In the forlorn silence, you can hear the rust forming.

An artist's rendition of the National Stadium for the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing. [file photo]

This is a serious issue in my neck of the woods. Some lucky, or perhaps unlucky, host in London, Madrid, Moscow, New York or Paris will have to arrange for tae kwon do palaces and team handball temples - plus have a clue what to do with the buildings after the cheering stops.

In Beijing these days, the prudent organizers for the 2008 Summer Games are translating the phrase "white elephant" into Mandarin, so they can avoid vacant buildings on the morning after.

At this very moment, the good people of Athens are coping with their empty legacy, along with the cost of the recent Summer Games, recently upgraded to $11.6 billion, not counting improvements to the city's transportation and other infrastructure.

"You must have a master plan," said Fanni Palli-Petralia, the deputy culture minister of Greece, who is now in charge of administering all those unused facilities.

Because of the three-year delay in building for the recent Games, Athens had little time to secure the future of all those buildings that shone so prettily in the August sunshine. Now it gets tricky to get caretakers and money and events back in them.

This improvisation happens after almost every world sports event. The taxpayers of Japan and South Korea paid for more than a few soccer stadiums with no resident team after the last World Cup soccer game in 2002. Sydney, theoretically a paragon of Olympic planning for the 2000 Games, has a vastly underused stadium.

What to do with these expensive structures? The best answer I ever heard came from a Zen Buddhist monk in Nagano, Japan, at the end of the 1998 Winter Games. Taka Fukushima, a priest at Zenkoji Temple, who had once lived in Michigan and spoke English, said:

"I see the children of Japan feeling happy for the success of our athletes," and he suggested that the best thing Nagano could do would be to tear down some of the buildings to save further taxes and maintenance. How Zen is that?

"We are not going to demolish any venues," Palli-Petralia insisted at breakfast yesterday while visiting New York. She said she had a budget to organize a mixed public and private use of all the sites. A Greek government release earlier this week said that 85 million euros ($113.3 million) had been allocated for their maintenance in 2005.

Americans should take a skeptical look at the Greek quandary because, even with very capable people planning the NYC2012 bid, there are huge pitfalls in being an Olympic host - particularly in a climate of widespread drug abuse. Why build arenas for cheaters?

Palli-Petralia, a conservative member of the Greek parliament since 1985, was appointed to the culture post last March, after the Games were rescued by Gianna Angelopoulos-Daskalaki, the charismatic lawyer who took over the faltering project.

"For us, for Greeks, it is a question of heritage," Palli-Petralia said yesterday, referring to Greece being the host of the original Games, more than 2,000 years ago. However, the International Olympic Committee stresses legacy along with heritage.

"We gained the image of a modern country," Palli-Petralia said, speaking of the modernized transit and hotels and public spaces, but also the artistry and skill of the organizers.

Palli-Petralia, whose father was an athlete and a member of the I.O.C., said she accompanied him to her first Summer Games as a child in Rome in 1960. She said Greece was planning for international sports events, including possible shot-put and javelin competitions in Ancient Olympia, where the shot-put was held with great reverence in August.

There are also plans to create a track and field museum, as well as a separate museum of three major Games held in Athens in 1896, 1906 and 2004. The vacant Main Press Center is to be turned into an environmental center.

However, some Greek citizens are complaining about the empty buildings.

Does Palli-Petralia have advice for future hosts?

"Don't lose a day," she said. "This is the most important thing.

"Also, you have to plan what you are going to do with them and integrate the needs of the Olympics."

In New York, the committee has described a potential use for each proposed site. Andrew Kimball, the director of operations for NYC2012, will have a budget of $75 million for arranging the so-called legacy of each, according to Daniel L. Doctoroff, the deputy mayor and NYC2012 founder.

"Over the years, the issue of legacy has become increasingly important," Doctoroff said yesterday, contending that only six sites would have to be turned over at the end of the 2012 Games, including two expected to be privately run.

The other sites will have ongoing tenants by 2012, he said, including the proposed, and highly controversial, Olympic Stadium.

There are other issues aside from legacy. But right now, legacy of Olympic sites is a huge preoccupation in a city that buzzed with visitors only a few months ago.

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