by Jessica Reed
There are the enormous security costs to consider, not to mention the fact that the city will most assuredly undergo a mass gentrification, which does not mean that those with nothing will suddenly be provided decent jobs and new homes or apartments. It means that, as occurred in 1986 during Expo, the embarrassing elements of our fair city will be pushed East down the Hastings corridor as if by a gigantic, magic broom. - Vancouverite blogger Matthew Good on the 2010 Olympics.
I remember the day London won the Olympics bid very clearly: I was still interning for Demos at the time, and everyone was gathered around the television waiting for the annoucement, eager to find out if their city would turn out to be the winner and host of the Games. Being french, I was gently teased by my colleagues: "you will owe us a round at the pub soon!". When the name of London was finally secured as the 2012 Olympics city everyone cheered, proudly smiling. I did not care much for the results, but it was a pleasure to see Londoners so thrilled. As it turned out, the excitement and enthusiasm was damaged with the grim events of following day.
Fast forward to a year later, and the enthusiasn seems to be at its lowest point as the Games face a huge tax bill, with costs currently estimated at £3.33 billion, a figure which is expected to soar and excludes VAT on construction work. And if London mayor promised no increased on council taxes, it is said that each taxpayer will pay £20 a year to sustain the Olympics' projects. Yesterday Livingston promised that the Olympics will make profit, in spite of a 40 per cent increase in the projected overall cost. This is not to mention the hundreds of businesses and families who will be evicted out of East London's Stratford - an aera which will face huge structural changes as the Olympics constructions start next June: a good part of East London can kiss goodbye most of its affordable housing for low income families.
Not that any of this matters if you have money- if taxpayers in Athens have paid huge bills back in 2004 as the Games costed about £6.4 billion,companies like NBC Universal gathered profits of more than $70 million thanks to their involvment in the Greek Olympics Games.
When still living in Vancouver in 2005 (the winter Games are to take place in Whilster in four years), I talked to numerous people who were well-off enough to invest in real estate, planning to sell at a much higher price comes 2010. Meanwhile, some Vancouverites beg to differ with this perspective, thinking the city should have voted against hosting them because of financial and environmental concerns- as Detroit did back in 1972. It usually takes decades for cities to reimburse their Olympics debt, and I am just hesitant to assert that 30 years down the line and still working to erase that debt, London will look back at 2012 with fondness or nostalgia.
Elsewhere: Games Monitor - a network of people raising awareness about issues within the London Olympic development processes.
