Can’t blame them. I hope they will allow families of athletes in.
Not looking good on the domestic fan front, either.
I’ll be surprised if the Games happens at all.
Doesn’t seem much point in doing it then. It’s meant to be an international event. Plus the home country always does better due to local support, but this would affect the results even more.
I think the Japanese government will move heaven and earth to make sure the games don’t get canceled. They’ve already invested anywhere from 15 to 30 billion dollars in infrastructure, and with the games already postponed once, a cancellation on top of that will be a big blow to national pride.
Not to mention that if the games are cancelled, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) loses the TV contracts which provide the majority of their grifting slush fund. However, this might be largely mitigated by the insurance policies they purchased.
Japan can still recoup some costs by selling tickets to domestic fans, and selling advertising space in the venues to companies. IMO, they should try what sport leagues in the USA did by charging fans to put cardboard cutouts of themselves in the unoccupied seats.
As far as the infrastructure goes. Isn’t that already mission accomplished? I always thought the olympics were an excuse to build the infrastructure for other non olympic reasons.
Yeah, that part’s done and dusted. It will just be embarrassing that they did so much work in building all of this, and then not being able to use it for its intended purpose. At this point, forget about profits, it’s about limiting the amount of money they can lose.
It remains to be seen whether they can repurpose the venues built specifically for the Olympics into ones suitable for general public use, but I doubt it considering the state of disrepair that other venues from Rio de Janeiro, Athens, etc., have fallen victim to.
But London did an excellent job with this.
The infrastructure is never worth it, and often gets underused or unused entirely. Getting back at least some of the money by holding the Olympics and selling tickets and merch is a necessity to make it slightly less of a money pit.
Atlanta reused a lot . Athlete Village was converted to college dorms. Stadium was used by Braves for 20 years and now by Georgia State FB. Georgia dome was used for FB and some BB but it was imploded and replaced by Mercedes Benz stadium a few years back.
Turner Field is gone, too
Sure, the main Olympic stadium is probably reusable for something but they build all sorts of specialty venues (high dive, water polo pool, equestrian center, white water rafting course, etc) that really don’t have a second life. I think in London they tried to build some facilities so they could be dismantled after. But in general, the Olympics involve enormous cost and waste.
Isn’t it being used for college football now?
I guess so; I thought it had been demolished, but not so. It was reconfigured as a small football stadium for Georgia State.