[Rumour] Calgary preparing for 2026 Winter Olympics bid. May open door to CalgaryNEXT funding

[GioforPM]

Canada should work on qualifying for a WC, not hosting one.

[Flash Walken]

Originally Posted by Barnes

How does BC Place renovation provide any insight on what would be required to renovate a speed skating oval and what those cost might be?

Because it's the idea that Calgary somehow benefits in an Olympic bid because they already have the 40 year old facilities.

There is a benefit perhaps to already having the land rights for specific sites, but all of Calgary's 1988 olympic infrastructure will have to be updated and that will all be costly.

Ballooning constructions costs are essentially a hallmark of Olympic construction, and pretty much any deadline dependent development.

How much will it cost to turn this:

Spoiler!

into This:

Spoiler!

This notion that Calgary has a leg up on their competition because they hosted the games in 1988 is wishful thinking at this point. You're talking new ski jumps, new bobsled track, new stadium for hockey, potential new stadium for ceremonies, etc etc. Is Max Bell going to be good enough for Curling and speed skating again, or does that facility also require substantial upgrades to accommodate fan seating etc?

Having the mountains so close by is definitely a feather in the cap for a Calgary bid, but everything else will have to either undergo a costly renovation or be built completely from scratch.

Is McMahon going to host the opening and closing ceremonies again, or will that be in the Field House?

[polak]

Originally Posted by GioforPM

Canada should work on qualifying for a WC, not hosting one.

Hosting one is pretty much their only shot of qualifying for one.

[CroFlames]

Originally Posted by Senator Clay Davis

Yeah that'll never even be close to good enough. America has 30+ ready made, much better facilities than Canada. Expecting to throw grass on McMahon, Commonwealth, SkyDome, BC Place, Olympic Stadium, Winnipeg (and even then, that's really weak as most hosts have 10-12 venues) and it being good enough is very hopeful, and highly unlikely. Probably looking at 4-6 brand new venues from scratch.

I'd think $3 billion is the very, very low end of cost to host a WC, security costs excluded. Joint bid with the US still makes the most sense for a cost control perspective...but the US can host it solo, so they don't need us.

I was merely quoting a price to put grass in the existing stadiums. Of course an actually bid will be in the billions, plus the cost of adding grass to existing venues.

Originally Posted by Flash Walken

Because it's the idea that Calgary somehow benefits in an Olympic bid because they already have the 40 year old facilities.

There is a benefit perhaps to already having the land rights for specific sites, but all of Calgary's 1988 olympic infrastructure will have to be updated and that will all be costly.

Ballooning constructions costs are essentially a hallmark of Olympic construction, and pretty much any deadline dependent development.

How much will it cost to turn this:

Spoiler!

into This:

Spoiler!

This notion that Calgary has a leg up on their competition because they hosted the games in 1988 is wishful thinking at this point. You're talking new ski jumps, new bobsled track, new stadium for hockey, potential new stadium for ceremonies, etc etc. Is Max Bell going to be good enough for Curling and speed skating again, or does that facility also require substantial upgrades to accommodate fan seating etc?

Having the mountains so close by is definitely a feather in the cap for a Calgary bid, but everything else will have to either undergo a costly renovation or be built completely from scratch.

Is McMahon going to host the opening and closing ceremonies again, or will that be in the Field House?

I don't think Calgary has an advantage per se, but I think the redeeming quality or silver lining is that the venues Calgary does build for a future Olympics would get well used long after the Olympics are gone. I remember playing men's league with games starting at 11:45PM! Not enough hockey rinks for starters.

[Bandwagon In Flames]

We should start a poll something along the lines of:

Is anyone under the age of 40 opposed to a 2026 Olympics in Calgary?

Pretty sure I already know what the results would be.

[polak]

It's depressing that if we do get this, I'll be way too old to enjoy it like I would if it happened today.

Life's a bitch and then you die.

[Locke]

Originally Posted by GioforPM

Canada should work on qualifying for a WC, not hosting one.

Hosting it is typically how that happens.

[Senator Clay Davis]

But can Canada try and import a bunch of players like Qatar? It's gotta be more appealing to live in Canada, if not as financially beneficial.

[SuperMatt18]

Originally Posted by polak

It's depressing that if we do get this, I'll be way too old to enjoy it like I would if it happened today.

Life's a bitch and then you die.

Especially because we are an age that missed some good ones.

Salt Lake, Tofino, and Vancouver were great ones but I was too young to really enjoy the first two, and Vancouver was in the middle of my final University semester.

Now we have a run of Sochi, Bejing, and Pyeongchang, which while they are still fun events, are not at the level of a event hosted on European or North American soil for a male in his mid-twenties.

[corporatejay]

Originally Posted by Flash Walken

How does this in any way address cost overruns 5x that of the initially stated budget?

Does Calgary need a Billion Dollar Olympic Oval?

What? Your comment was that upgrades are usually more expensive than building from scratch and you used BC place as an example.

My point was that even for $500 million dollars that's way way cheaper than building a brand new building.

[Barnes]

Originally Posted by polak

It's depressing that if we do get this, I'll be way too old to enjoy it like I would if it happened today.

Life's a bitch and then you die.

Don't be so negative. I'll be 46 and plan to get turnt up if it happens. Olympics aren't cheap, being older will have its benefits.

[Coach]

Originally Posted by Flash Walken

This notion that Calgary has a leg up on their competition because they hosted the games in 1988 is wishful thinking at this point. You're talking new ski jumps, new bobsled track, new stadium for hockey, potential new stadium for ceremonies, etc etc. Is Max Bell going to be good enough for Curling and speed skating again, or does that facility also require substantial upgrades to accommodate fan seating etc?

Having the mountains so close by is definitely a feather in the cap for a Calgary bid, but everything else will have to either undergo a costly renovation or be built completely from scratch.

Is McMahon going to host the opening and closing ceremonies again, or will that be in the Field House?

Is it just me, or do those ovals not look much different from each other? Of course ours would need a significant aesthetic upgrade, but the facility is largely operational and usable already.

I think the advantage Calgary has in't necessarily the cost (although I think it's just logical that upgrading existing facilities would be less expensive than building new ones), it's that we are one of the few spots that actually use those facilities after the events. All of that stuff is still being used to train Canadian athletes, and still will be used long after the Olympics are gone. I think this is something unique to Calgary.

It would probably make the fieldhouse to need a retractable roof for the opening ceremonies, which obviously adds cost to that project. You could likely use Winsport for the curling/short track speed skating. I think it seats more than Max Bell and is almost brand new.

[RM14]

Curling in the corral would be pretty cool, if they give it a bit of a face lift. Keep the pictures of the king and queen though.

[getbak]

Originally Posted by MattyC

It would probably make the fieldhouse to need a retractable roof for the opening ceremonies

Both Vancouver and Sochi had their ceremonies under a roof.

[Flash Walken]

Originally Posted by corporatejay

What? Your comment was that upgrades are usually more expensive than building from scratch and you used BC place as an example.

My point was that even for $500 million dollars that's way way cheaper than building a brand new building.

My comment was based on this idea that it would somehow be cheaper for Calgary to host the olympics than it would be for a competitor because things like the Oval already exist in Calgary.

My point about upgrades often being more expensive than new construction is based on personal experience. This holds true in my experience when dealing with residential/commercial construction.

It CAN be cheaper to renovate than to build from scratch but this isn't some rule of renovation. It's very easy for renovations to eclipse the cost of a new build, especially when budgets are determined based on deadline rather than on being cost effective.

It's in the links I already posted, coming from the City Manager in Vancouver and from the Province. The necessity of having the majority of renovations completed prior to the Olympics is the primary reason for the inflated cost.

Renovating the Oval or Max Bell or wherever else on an Olympic timeline will invariable increase the construction costs because of the deadline to have them finished. The pressure from these deadlines will force the hand of politicians at the municipal and provincial level to authorize funds they otherwise wouldn't to avoid an negative political impact.

I'm not blaming the olympics for BCs bad economy, but since Vancouver won their bid for the 2010 Olympics in 2003, the provincial debt level has very nearly doubled to over 60 Billion dollars. A massive component of this debt level is a result of the infrastructure projects implemented as part of the vision towards 2010. A light rail line to the airport was and is awesome, a big boon for the city. However, because that investment was predicated on the Olympics, it was an infrastructure project that didn't address Vancouver's greatest need, light rail along North America's busiest transit Corridor (Commercial Drive to UBC along Broadway). As a direct result of the line out to the airport, a planned transit line that would connect more of the Greater Vancouver Regional District was delayed by a decade.

Because of the schedule to open the new light rail infrastructure, the project couldn't be done exclusively by underground tunneling but instead involved surface excavation and construction which had a very negative effect a large segment of the city (Cambie corridor).

I'm not trying to make this Vancouver-centric, but when any city engages in these kind of activities, they develop infrastructure that isn't necessarily based on need. This CalgaryNEXT proposal / Olympic bid parallels this.

The city of Vancouver would have developed the Olympic Village neighbourhood over a period of decades instead of a few years were it not for the Olympics and Calgary is looking at the same scenario with the West Village. According to their own internal discussions posted in these threads, they don't want to do anything with the West Village until the East Village is more established, which makes complete sense. In Vancouver, developing the Olympic village too quickly and taking on the loan for completion cost the city hundreds of millions of dollars.

The infrastructure that the Olympics brought to Vancouver is nice. The skyline is prettier now than it was, I love using the Canada Line, The Sea to Sky Highway is a bit less dangerous the one time a year I use it. But let's not be delusional about what it costs to do it.

It costs a ####load of money.

[DionTheDman]

Originally Posted by SuperMatt18

Now we have a run of Sochi, Bejing, and Pyeongchang, which while they are still fun events, are not at the level of a event hosted on European or North American soil for a male in his mid-twenties.

Why not?

[saskflames69]

Originally Posted by SuperMatt18

Especially because we are an age that missed some good ones.

Salt Lake, Tofino, and Vancouver were great ones but I was too young to really enjoy the first two, and Vancouver was in the middle of my final University semester.

Now we have a run of Sochi, Bejing, and Pyeongchang, which while they are still fun events, are not at the level of a event hosted on European or North American soil for a male in his mid-twenties.

I might miss out on attending the Olympics in my mid-twenties, but if they go through with this bid I'll still be 29 for a few months

and if I'm really lucky, I'll still get to go to another Calgary Olympics in 2064.

[SHOGUN]

Originally Posted by polak

It's depressing that if we do get this, I'll be way too old to enjoy it like I would if it happened today.

Life's a bitch and then you die.

And then we get .....

[polak]

Originally Posted by Barnes

Don't be so negative. I'll be 46 and plan to get turnt up if it happens. Olympics aren't cheap, being older will have its benefits.

I'll be getting completely white girl'd and partying like it's 2010...

[RM14]

Originally Posted by SHOGUN

And then we get .....

Spoiler!