Should Calgary Bid on the 2026 Olympics

[Senator Clay Davis]

Originally Posted by Rhettzky

This isn't money we'd otherwise get. So it's not like voting no gets these damn potholes patched any sooner.

####ing Christ I hate this argument so much. I went off even more in the other thread, but that we can't get infrastructure for ourselves, because we need it....but we sure can get it when we have to impress a bunch of visitors...what a bunch of horse####. That is what I hate about politicians so much. It's all about being part of the elites, about mingling with the elites, about raising ones profile for a bigger political gig. They apparently are incapable of helping us out of the need of citizens. But avoiding being an international embarrassment? Impressing a bunch of elites? All of a sudden, there's money for things (and the ability to far exceed a budget). For real though, #### that ####.

But the irony of the NDP wanting the plebiscite is wonderful isn't it? The NDP will not even be in power when the bid is due, so even if the plebiscite is 100% for, what exactly can they do about it? Kenney should be the one telling us what he wants to do here. Considering tax and spending cuts are likely to be his top two priorities, I seriously doubt he's gonna kick any money to this. And the feds have an election that year too, and vote buying to save three seats in Alberta is not gonna be that important (and Scheer isn't gonna offer us anything, he has our votes locked up, just like Harper did very little for us) when there will need to be vote buying in Ontario, Quebec and BC. We're an afterthought in federal elections after all.

[Slava]

^It's not that I disagree with your first sentence, but isn’t that basically reality? Sure, it would be great if the province and feds pumped a couple billion into Calgary just to complete some badly needed infrastructure, but there needs to be a catalyst.

[Senator Clay Davis]

And it's impressing visitors, not citizen needs. Kinda says it all no? More important for them to impress outsiders than voters. But that's the game, and it's why politicians are so loathed.

[Slava]

Originally Posted by Senator Clay Davis

And it's impressing visitors, not citizen needs. Kinda says it all no? More important for them to impress outsiders than voters. But that's the game, and it's why politicians are so loathed.

Some of the infrastructure is needed and long lasting though. It’s not all two weeks and then forgotten about, particularly here. I understand that the Greeks building baseball stadiums was a poor choice for them, but that’s not what we have done here in Canada. And when you look at the potential transit and transport infrastructure, that might be geared to the Olympics, but it serves citizens for decades.

I think you can still see the positive impact of the ‘88 games here. It’s a massive injection into the local economy that otherwise wouldn’t happen.

[Joborule]

Originally Posted by Senator Clay Davis

And it's impressing visitors, not citizen needs. Kinda says it all no? More important for them to impress outsiders than voters. But that's the game, and it's why politicians are so loathed.

At least we get it built quicker, and we benefit from it after the fact.

If the projects have a legacy of lasting after the games, then might as well reap the benefit of the game that the politicians play.

[Reaper]

Originally Posted by Reneeee

Good news if we win is that the snow removal plan in February 2026 will be way better than this year

Sent from my Pixel 2 using Tapatalk

Watch, Calgary will get the 2026 Olympics and it will be Chinook'ing the whole time and the big talk will be all of the artificial snow they have to make simply to hold the outdoor events.

[Rhettzky]

Originally Posted by Reaper

Watch, Calgary will get the 2026 Olympics and it will be Chinook'ing the whole time and the big talk will be all of the artificial snow they have to make simply to hold the outdoor events.

In '88 the same thing happened. My dad got us tickets to the bobsleds but they cancelled because it was too warm, or did it rain? I was really young.

[Wormius]

Originally Posted by Joborule

At least we get it built quicker, and we benefit from it after the fact.



If the projects have a legacy of lasting after the games, then might as well reap the benefit of the game that the politicians play.

Yeah, I don’t know the reasoning behind why it matters who it gets built for, as long as it gets built and benefits us in Calgary.

[Slava]

Originally Posted by Rhettzky

In '88 the same thing happened. My dad got us tickets to the bobsleds but they cancelled because it was too warm, or did it rain? I was really young.

I think I did a probability class years later and the teacher was saying how they should have looked at the history of those weeks and they probably would have moved the games for colder, snowier weather. It was super warm in 1988 and statistically that wasn’t totally surprising I guess.

(I have no idea how accurate that is btw, and it could be pure hindsight bias in action!)

[Fuzz]

Well if they wanted to ensure a long cold snowy winter, they should have had it this year.

[TheSutterDynasty]

Originally Posted by Senator Clay Davis

####ing Christ I hate this argument so much. I went off even more in the other thread, but that we can't get infrastructure for ourselves, because we need it....but we sure can get it when we have to impress a bunch of visitors...what a bunch of horse####. That is what I hate about politicians so much. It's all about being part of the elites, about mingling with the elites, about raising ones profile for a bigger political gig. They apparently are incapable of helping us out of the need of citizens. But avoiding being an international embarrassment? Impressing a bunch of elites? All of a sudden, there's money for things (and the ability to far exceed a budget). For real though, #### that ####.

The irony of your username is not lost on me.

[craigwd]

Originally Posted by Slava

I think I did a probability class years later and the teacher was saying how they should have looked at the history of those weeks and they probably would have moved the games for colder, snowier weather. It was super warm in 1988 and statistically that wasn’t totally surprising I guess.

(I have no idea how accurate that is btw, and it could be pure hindsight bias in action!)

They did look at historical weather forecasts and meteorological reports. The original plan was for the 88 Games to be held the last week of Feb and the first week of March because those were the optimum weather weeks.

However, February sweeps are the last 2 weeks of February and it was decided to move the Games up to coincide with that and maximize ad revenue.

Unfortunately the meteorologic data said there should be little difference. Ooops!

The organizing committee also looked at historical data and knew that the winters were going to be drier and warmer. That's why they had invested in new snow making equipment, stock piled snow and covered the Olympic Oval. The winds were the killer.

[FireGilbert]

Don't do it Calgary!

Personally, every time I'm waiting at a hospital or stuck in traffic I wish Sydney never hosted the 2000 Olympics. They ended up costing tax payers ~$2 billion with funds taken from health, education, and infrastructure. In return the city got a 2 week party that I wasn't even around for (my wife says it was pretty amazing though). The infrastructure improvements helped people get to the games but did nothing for the average commuter and there were no long term increases to the economy or tourism. The worst part is the white elephant Olympic stadium that less than 20 years later the government wants to replace for $1 billion.

[jayswin]

Originally Posted by FireGilbert

Don't do it Calgary!

Personally, every time I'm waiting at a hospital or stuck in traffic I wish Sydney never hosted the 2000 Olympics. They ended up costing tax payers ~$2 billion with funds taken from health, education, and infrastructure. In return the city got a 2 week party that I wasn't even around for (my wife says it was pretty amazing though). The infrastructure improvements helped people get to the games but did nothing for the average commuter and there were no long term increases to the economy or tourism. The worst part is the white elephant Olympic stadium that less than 20 years later the government wants to replace for $1 billion.

The perspective is appreciated, but some of that is only relevant to the Sydney games (summer games is also a way more expensive, stadium demanding event).

- Infrastructure only helping people get to the games in Sydney? Sure, but what if the infrastructure we build is also needed and coming eventually anyways? Which by all accounts is what we're after.

- Albatross stadiums? It's been made pretty clear by the IOC that we're not going to be building some monolithic opening ceremony stadium or venues that won't be fully utilized afterwords, likely just a new hockey arena, with local contribution likely not exceeding what we would have given the Flames anyways.

[getbak]

The Summer Games are a bloated beast that requires way too many different venues that are almost guaranteed to not get properly used afterwards.

The Winter Games are in danger of becoming that, especially in the smaller host cities, because you need 4 arenas of varying size to host all the ice events. I believe they're still manageable for larger cities like Calgary, Vancouver, and Salt Lake where those venues either already exist or can be made use of after the Games are over.

[FireGilbert]

I totally agree the Summer Olympics are a different beast and hopefully Calgary would learn from the mistakes of previous games.

I wanted to give my perspective living in a city that hosted a modern Olympics. My wife has a completely different view though. She was around for the party and believes the good times and national pride was well worth the cost.

At least the money was spent on the pinnacle of world sport though, unlike the idiots up on the Gold Coast dumping money down the drain for the lame commonwealth games.

[Mr.Coffee]

The plebiscite will be useless unless they clarify the anticipated spend and as well if they plan to build a new arena.

[para transit fellow]

Originally Posted by Reaper

Watch, Calgary will get the 2026 Olympics and it will be Chinook'ing the whole time and the big talk will be all of the artificial snow they have to make simply to hold the outdoor events.

That is actually my recollection of the 1988 Olympics

[Weitz]

I do love the fact that everyone is “ah what suckers for hosting the Olympics what a waste of money!” Until we have the chance to host.

[Robbob]

The problem is that this province could very well be 100 billion plus in debt by 2022. The debt servicing alone could be enough to pay for an Olympics each year. That is bad. I'd rather the province get the house in order so instead of paying billions to service the debt that money can be allocated to these projects.

The term legacy keeps being thrown out, but it doesn't make sense in the current economic state and climate for the province.