Tag Archives: London Olympics

Olympic Organisers Back Out of Promised Air Fare For Athletes

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The London Olympic 2012 Games Organisers promised £20 million in airfares to pay for the travel of athletes and officials.  They attempted to quietly withdraw from this commitment by the use of price caps and a distance formula.  Countries without direct flights to London will be out of pocket having a greater effect on poorer countries especially those from Africa and the Pacific, who like Londoners are finding out that Olympic promises are easily broken. Zimbabwe’s Olympic committee secretary general Robert Mutsauki said the African nations would hold the London organisers to their promises. Good luck!

Full Article Here.

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Spurs bid for Olympic 2012 stadium without track

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Spurs challenge how much the Olympic Legacy Company really want an athletics track.

Spurs, in conjunction with entertainment giant AEG, made a shock move last week to take over the stadium after the 2012 London Olympics. But the club do not want a track running around the outside of the pitch, a clause which could seriously hinder their attempt to move into the venue. Or will it?

Timothy Leiweke , chief executive of the club, claimed the Olympic Legacy company would be likely not to accept their bid in light of these circumstances. “I think it is a crime if you sacrifice having a perfect football stadium for convincing yourself you are going to do a track and field event every 10 years,” Leiweke was quoted as saying in the London Evening Standard.

AEG Europe chief executive David Campbell believes the athletics track is not a deal breaker. He claimed that any expressions of interest in the stadium which would decide the venue’s future, did not oblige bidders to retain the running track.

Will the promised Olympic “legacy” of an athletics track trump the money on offer? Will West Ham United regret promising to keep the track in their bid if Spurs win? Will the famous West Ham atmosphere survive the dead space of the track or will it become another loss in the litany of negative Olympic impacts on East London?

For full article see here.

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London 2012 Olympics saved from cuts in Comprehensive Spending Review

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Drapers Fields trashed for an Olympic depot

Grass roots sports lose- Olympics win

Schools and community sports will be the biggest losers under the Comprehensive Spending Review while the London Olympic project is likely to avoid major cuts to its budget or contingency. Losses of local sports amenities like Hackney Marshes and Drapers Fields as a result of the Olympics will now roll out across the nation as non-Olympic cuts hit.

The Department of Culture, Media and Sport is understood to have reached a settlement with the Treasury that will see about 30 per cent cut from its annual £1.6 billion budget. However London 2012 will  escape significant cuts to its £9.3 billion budget, and is expected to have its remaining contingency fund left largely untouched, partly out of necessity and partly expediency.

It is claimed that most of the major Olympic contracts have been awarded, so it is too late for major savings. The games are predicted to be completed with surplus contingency of £700 million. However the DCMS and the Olympic bodies have argued that is politically better to leave the contingency in place rather than take it back, and risk having to pay out in the event of an unforeseen crisis in the project.

The cuts to the DCMS budget will make it unlikely that the government can deliver on its promise of an abiding participation legacy from the London 2012 Olympics.
Sports minister Hugh Robertson will prioritise protecting funding for elite athletes in the run up to the London Games, and grass roots initiatives and projects run by UK Sport and Sport England’s will be cut.
Shadow Olympics Minister Tessa Jowell who told the nation the Olympics would only cost £3bn when it was nearer £10bn now claims she is concerned school sports initiatives will be hit by the cuts. So clearly nothing to do with her.

The details of the Olympic funding will not be announced by the Government on Wednesday. The cuts are likely to be made public on Thursday.

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Glastonbury Cancelled Due To London Olympics

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Glastonbury 2012 has been cancelled due to the London Olympics procuring all available portable toilets in the south of England. In addition, the organisers have also been told that all the 600 strong police force which patrols the event will also be redirected to patrol the Olympics.

Michael Eavis spoke of a price hike in 2012 for any spare toilets due to their scarcity, which would also inevitably lead to problems. “I can see it getting very expensive,” he said. “So we looked at the timing and thought that a year off seemed sensible.”

Sadly, yet somewhat unsurprisingly, the Glastonbury Festival has become another casualty of the ever increasing collateral damage inflicted by the controversial 2012 Olympic event.

For the full article see Live4Ever.

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Unexploded bomb could lie underneath Olympic Stadium

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The Olympic Delivery Authority has dismissed claims that there could be an unexploded bomb lying beneath its Stratford stadium.

However, according to Government records, a German bomb dropped in a tip on the exact site of the stadium during the Blitz.
Records exist of bombings during the war, which state that a large hole was left in a rubbish shoot at the refuse site after an air-raid. Despite several searches throughout the 1940s, no bomb was uncovered at the site.

A report by weapons company BAE Systems for the Government in 2007 concluded that explosive material must lie beneath the site of the stadium of the intensity of air raids in the area during the war.

A spokesman for the ODA said that more than 3,000 searches for unexploded bombs had been carried out across the Olympic Park, including the Marshgate Lane stadium.

For full article click here.

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Olympic Marathon dumps East End for tourist landmarks

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The London Olympic Marathon will not go through the East End or finish at the Olympic Stadium as is tradition. To please the Olympic Committee, it will pass through the West End showcasing tourist landmarks St Paul’s Cathedral, the Houses of Parliament and Tower of London.  The race is planned to finish in the Mall with Buckingham Palace as its TV friendly backdrop. The race walks are also set to be held in central London instead of the East London as first planned.

Rushanara Ali, the MP for Bethnal Green and Bow, has claimed that the change meant that organisers were “embarrassed and ashamed to showcase the area and its people to the world”
“If LOCOG goes ahead with this proposal, the message they send to the world is ‘while we are happy to use the vibrancy, dynamism and diversity of the East End of London to win the Olympics bid, we’re embarrassed and ashamed to showcase the area and its people to the world’,” said Ali.

Tower Hamlets Council have created a petition as well Facebook group to protest the decision. They claim that Sebastian Coe, chairman of London 2012, had promised them that the marathons would pass through their area.

In his defense, Coe stated that “This is not a beauty contest and it would be ludicrous to suggest that we are ashamed of the East End,” when he met with Ali during the Labour Party Conference in Manchester. Although defiant, Coe did promise that the Olympic Torch Relay would pass through East London.

The London Thames Gateway Development Corporation (LTGDC), the Government’s lead regeneration agency for East London, has described the decision not to route the marathons and walks through that area as a “missed opportunity” to promote the region as a key investment destination to international investors.

As with Greenwich Park (see here and here), spectacular televisual backdrops demanded by the Olympic Committee override the interests of London and its residents.

To read more visit insidethegames.biz

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The Downside of Commonwealth ‘Jugad’ : Mega-Event Footbridges

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Grafitti Athens 2004

Graffiti Athens 2004

Images of the collapsed footbridge neighbouring New Delhi’s Jawaharlal Nehru main stadium have made front-page news across the globe and shone unflattering light on India’s Commonwealth Games preparation. The Games, which are due to begin in under two weeks on the 3rd October, have been dogged by whispers of corruption, corner-cutting and a lack of leadership. Such whispers have recently descended into deafening shouts as concerns are voiced, by laymen and ministers alike, about the quality of construction efforts. Newly-erected buildings have been left in varying states of dilapidation due to annual monsoons, and the athletes’ village has been denounced as unfit for habitation.

It is possible that such a high-profile setback may become a symbol of the dangers of rushing regeneration into cities and societies unready for it, given that it has ultimately caused more destruction than good and more haste has resulted in less speed. Similarly, another footbridge closer to home, though still un-built, has also caused destruction. Manor Gardens in East London, a 100-year-old allotment, was wiped off the map for an Olympic footbridge, and though this footbridge may not fall apart, the loss of this historic and green site is perhaps a troubling indicator in itself of progress for the sake of thinly-defined progress.

If the concept, as well as the spirit of jugad is alive and well (the idea that things will get done, by hook or by crook), then organisers may be hoping that what is quickly turning into a Commonwealth debacle is only an exception that proves the rule.

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Wanstead Flats: Green space to Olympic holding cells?

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Wanstead Flats: A vast, open grassland in Epping Forest, east London, surrounded by residential areas: This is where the Metropolitan Police plans to site an operational centre for the 2012 Olympics. On 5th September 2010, about 350 people attended a Mass Community Picnic on Wanstead Flats, demonstrating their opposition to the police’s proposal.

Official statements by the City of London, responsible for Epping Forest, have stated it will be a police briefing centre in the southwestern part of the Flats for a period of three months. However, subsequent conversations with officials have revealed that the site, covering three hectares, will seemingly be used for police deployment, and include a feeding station and stabling for police horses and also holding cells. Since those plans became public in June, local residents have started to organise their protest in order to preserve the open green space. Wanstead Flats are protected by the Epping Forest Act, 1878 which inhibits any use other than for recreation and public enjoyment and does not allow the erection of permanent structures. It is feared that the police’s proposal will set a precedent for further developments on the Flats in the near future. The fact that the Epping Forest Act has to be adapted in order to legalize the planned project is strengthening these apprehensions. These and other critical issues such as lack of public consultation, concerns about traffic and accessibility were discussed by local residents during the event on 5th September with Paul Thomson, Superintendent of Epping Forest. Two similar temporary police centres are to be erected for the Olympic Games, one in Hackney and another in Greenwich.

The next Local Residents’ Public Meeting of the Save Wanstead Flats Campaign will take place on Wednesday 6th October 2010, 7pm, at Durning Hall Community Centre, Earlham Grove, Forest Gate E7 9AB. For further information see savewansteadflats.org.uk

Wanstead Flats is one of many green sites that the “Greenest Olympics” will affect.

Sign the Petition now!

This is one of many green sites that the “Greenest Olympics” will destroy also see

Park to be tarmaced for Olympics

Basildon is latest signing to Disgruntled First XI

Greenwich Park, a centre for Equestrian Excellence? Perhaps not

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The Olympic Games – A Gift, or A Curse?

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Rohantha Athukorala serves the United Nations (UNOPS) as the Head of National Portfolio Development for Sri Lanka & Maldives based in Sri Lanka, and writes in The Island about the commitments a country should consider before taking on a global event such as The Olympics.

Since the beginning of the modern Olympic Games in …, man has come to believe that hosting the Games is one of the greatest privileges a country could have bestowed upon them.

With the Olympics, comes the promise of thousands of new jobs and business opportunities, the development of world-class sport facilities, and a chance to raise a countries profile-but when discussing this great opportunity, many seem to forget to mention the financial risk that comes hand in hand.

Back in 2004, Greece spent $12.5 billion on the games which subsequently led to 2% points being shaved off the GDP, with some even referring to this deficit as the trigger for the financial crisis in Europe. Now for the 2012 Olympics, the UK is investing $14.3 Billion despite it’s fiscal deficit of 12%, and despite industry think tanks stating that hosting the event is unlikely to have any substantial financial impact.

If the Olympics is to remain a coveted event, Rohantha Athukorala argues that a revolutionary approach is needed in order to minimise costs and maximise gains. The solution that we propose is to hold the Olympic Games 2016, 2020, 2024, 2028, ad infinitum, in it’s original 776 BC home, Greece.

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Mass Picnic To Save Wanstead Flats 5th September

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The “Save Wanstead Flats Campaign” invite all of us to protest with a picnic on Sunday 5th September.


All welcome 1pm on the spot to the west of Centre Road where the police want to site their Olympic operations base in 2012. Ever since over 250 people attended a packed public meeting in July, residents living near Wanstead Flats have been demanding answers about plans by the City of London Corporation to allow the Metropolitan Police to base its Olympics operational centre on the Flats in 2012. In order to push this proposal through, the Corporation would need to amend an Act of Parliament that has protected Wanstead Flats from enclosure and development for well over a century.

Local people want to know why the proposed site for this police base, west of Centre Road, has been chosen, how that decision was made and why the Olympic stadium site itself cannot be used. There has been no consultation, even though the plans involve locating a fenced, high-security compound – with buildings, parking areas, stables and apparently even police holding cells – for at least 120 days and so close to residential neighbourhoods.

The Save Wanstead Flats campaign is organised by local people and on Sunday 5 September, we’d like to invite you to show your opposition to the City of London Corporation’s plans by joining us for a picnic – occupying the very spot where the police operations base would be constructed.  FLYER MAP

BRING FOOD, PICNIC BLANKETS, YOUR CHILDREN AND YOUR FRIENDS! MEET ALL YOUR NEIGHBOURS WHO ALSO WANT TO SAVE WANSTEAD FLATS!

Sign the Petition now!

This is one of many green sites that the “Greenest Olympics” will destroy also see

Park to be tarmaced for Olympics

Basildon is latest signing to Disgruntled First XI

Hackney Marshes

London 2012 Equestrian Events

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