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Toronto 2024 Olympic Bid (Dead)

"Riiiiight, and it'd be foolish to focus on such trivial ancillary benefits as transit, infrastructure, tourism, employment... ? I mean, it's just a sporting event after all. "

If the ancillary benefits were actually realized, it might not be so bad. But time and again that is not what happens to host cities. A few tiny gains come at a staggering cost.

Do you think all those people in past host cities are simply lying? Even though they lived through it, and paid for it (not just financially) they don't really know what they are talking about?

How much are you, personally, willing to chip in for this? $500? $1000? The bid itself costs millions. Will you contribute to it?
 
TOperson:

I think you have only provided us with a subset of individuals with negative opinion of the games on their lives. While I wouldn't discount those experiences, I don't think one can definitively say that hosting the games is undesirable on that basis.

How much are you, personally, willing to chip in for this? $500? $1000? The bid itself costs millions. Will you contribute to it?
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Be careful going down that line of argument - if you are going to challenge someone on that basis, be aware that one can easily apply the same logic to question funding for social programs.

AoD
 
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sixrings said:
Could I ask if there was a for sure NFL team being relocated here and someone like bell or rogers would pay for half the stadium would you be a little more open to an olympics? The Olympic stadium is a big cost of the event. Also did everyone whose against the olympic bid, protest the cost of the G20 security as well...
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This one's easy. No, because I think NFL football is boring. I understand this puts me in the minority.
 
Tewder said:
... Riiiiight, and it'd be foolish to focus on such trivial ancillary benefits as transit, infrastructure, tourism, employment... ? I mean, it's just a sporting event after all.
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I'm beyond bored with the ancillary benefits argument. Tourism is not ancillary as that's sort of the point of an Oly or World Trade Fair. But Toronto is BOOMING! We don't need an Oly to boost housing. We're spending billions on transit already. We're growing employment in real jobs, not two weeks of telling tourists how to catch a shuttle bus.

Could someone who wants an Oly tell me how this will actually be fun? Build a frickin' argument around that, instead of assuming it's obvious.
 
RRR:

How about this - and it has nothing to do with tangible, physical benefits that proponents love to put forth: it's what the Olympics can potentially do for the psyche of Torontonians. Unlike Montreal, Calgary or Vancouver - we don't seem to have any salient event in our history that mark our coming of age. That, and somehow we are stuck with this risk-adverse guilt complex - that somehow spending money to anything that is high-risk/high-payoff, and/or purely for the sake of self-promotion is a no-go.

AoD
 
"TOperson:

I think you have only provided us with a subset of individuals with negative opinion of the games on their lives. While I wouldn't discount those experiences, I don't think one can definitively say that hosting the games is undesirable on that basis."

On this forum, yes, but there are many websites and blogs coming out of host and bid cities that go into the details of what is wrong with the Olympics. It's not hard to find, there's plenty of it. It's there for anyone who cares to look. Since you will pay for the games if Toronto gets them, you might find it relevant.

"Be careful going down that line of argument - if you are going to challenge someone on that basis, be aware that one can easily apply the same logic to question funding for social programs."

So? I'm fine with having that discussion too, about all government spending. (Imagine having that one about police spending when our crime rates are decreasing. I think that would be very worthwhile!)
 
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AlvinofDiaspar said:
RRR:

How about this - and it has nothing to do with tangible, physical benefits that proponents love to put forth: it's what the Olympics can potentially do for the psyche of Torontonians. Unlike Montreal, Calgary or Vancouver - we don't seem to have any salient event in our history that mark our coming of age. That, and somehow we are stuck with this risk-adverse guilt complex - that somehow spending money to anything that is high-risk/high-payoff, and/or purely for the sake of self-promotion is a no-go.

AoD
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What? No, seriously. That reminds me of those "Because I'm worth it" shampoo (or whatever it was) ads. Spending billions of dollars on a two-week sporting event to stroke fragile egos? Sell that to the other Ontarians and Canadians who get to chip in for it. Like they care how Toronto feels about itself.
 
Better than most

AlvinofDiaspar said:
RRR:

How about this - and it has nothing to do with tangible, physical benefits that proponents love to put forth: it's what the Olympics can potentially do for the psyche of Torontonians. Unlike Montreal, Calgary or Vancouver - we don't seem to have any salient event in our history that mark our coming of age. That, and somehow we are stuck with this risk-adverse guilt complex - that somehow spending money to anything that is high-risk/high-payoff, and/or purely for the sake of self-promotion is a no-go.

AoD
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Not bad, AoD, but unlike many (and maybe because I arrived in '91 and so remember only the WS craziness on Yonge and the ensuing 20-year boom) I've never known Toronto as anything BUT a city that had 'come of age'. Maybe if I had seen the parking lot village captured in some of this sites' archival photos, I'd say we need something to 'prove' ourselves.

MY Toronto doesn't need an Oly to prove itself - it's already an Alpha city.
 
Riverdale Rink Rat said:
Toronto is BOOMING! We don't need an Oly to boost housing. We're spending billions on transit already.
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Exactly!

Despite what people may think, Toronto is flush with transit expansion cash. Between the Spadina subway, the Eglinton LRT, the commitments to Transit City, the upgrade of Union station and the various Metrolinx projects, I think that Toronto might have about $12 billion in transit projects earmarked.

It's not that we don't have enough money to expand transit (which is really the only reason that I would support the Olympics at all), it's that we aren't spending the money on transit in a wise, coordinated way*. Nothing suggests that an Olympics would compel us to make better spending decisions on transit. In fact, given that we will singularly be focused on transporting people to sporting venues, and not thinking about the transit needs of our city afterward, I would argue we would actually be making even worse decisions than we currently do.

*See countless posts in the Transportation & Infrastructure thread which suggest countless ways that we could be spending that money better, ranging from the DRL to regional rail to a Transit City where the damn train doesn't stop every 400 meters.
 
To be fair - that's money put forth by the province - did Torontonians actually took the risk and made most of these funding decisions themselves? That's the risk adverse attitude I am getting at, not the more tangible aspects of bidding and planning for the games and the merits of the technicalities itself. Same goes for Waterfront revitalization, etc.

TOperson:

Sell that to the other Ontarians and Canadians who get to chip in for it. Like they care how Toronto feels about itself.
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And yet we are supposed to care how economic activity generated by our city region had been, and is continued supposed to prop up their feeling of self? I think you couldn't have illustrated my point of the Torontonian guilt trip better.

AoD
 
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AlvinofDiaspar said:
To be fair - that's money put forth by the province - did Torontonians actually took the risk and made most of these funding decisions themselves? That's the risk adverse attitude I am getting at, not the more tangible aspects of bidding and planning for the games and the merits of the technicalities itself. Same goes for Waterfront revitalization, etc.

TOperson:



And yet we are supposed to care how economic activity generated by our city region had been, and is continued supposed to prop up their feeling of self? I think you couldn't have illustrated my point of the Torontonian guilt trip better.

AoD
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What are you talking about? I've never heard of this "Torontonian guilt trip". Why would Toronto feel guilty about its economic activity? Who ever said that Toronto's economy "propped up" other parts of Ontario/Canada's "feeling of self"? Where are you getting that from?

Usually what I hear is "blahblah Toronto deserves investment from senior govts because it's the economic engine blahblah", never "Toronto feels really bad about its economic importance and hopes the other parts of the province/country will forgive it". Lots of communities feel they get short shrift because Toronto sucks up so much funding. That's their perception. And it would be a correct one if the Olympics were here. We'd be looking at at least $10B in combined public funding, just for the GTA.
 
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A further thought: Let's say Toronto does have some sort of guilt complex about its economic importance. Is spending billions on a two-week sports fest for the city the right way to atone for it?
 
AlvinofDiaspar said:
TOperson:

Be careful going down that line of argument - if you are going to challenge someone on that basis, be aware that one can easily apply the same logic to question funding for social programs.
AoD
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Yes, I guess we can put TOperson into the same camp as Rob Ford. You know, it's the mentality that believes we should cut funding Pride so as to 'save' money, that the gays should be proud enough by now and if not then let them pay for it themselves!... and heck, why stop there? Let's cut funding for TIFF and Luminato too. These things are an inconvenience to most real Torontonians and the money could be way better spent, right??

... and for that matter why just stop at annual events? Where's the real tangible and quantifiable payback to the arts or to education? ... and sports?? Heck no! Cut it all!!

Then again, there's always Riverdale Rat's visionary perspective that dismisses the importance of ancillary benefits altogether as 'boring'?

Riverdale Rink Rat said:
I'm beyond bored with the ancillary benefits argument. Tourism is not ancillary as that's sort of the point of an Oly or World Trade Fair. But Toronto is BOOMING! We don't need an Oly to boost housing. We're spending billions on transit already. We're growing employment in real jobs, not two weeks of telling tourists how to catch a shuttle bus.

Could someone who wants an Oly tell me how this will actually be fun? Build a frickin' argument around that, instead of assuming it's obvious.
Click to expand...

It must be nice to be Riverdale Rat! I mean, everything is booming and we don't have to worry about economic benefits at all... and especially if it means being bored by an unnecessary international sporting event!

... and can somebody please ban TOperson from mentioning anything about Athens ever again? Do we really need to point out that Toronto is simply not Athens, in any way?? I can sympathize that some truly do not want the Olympics but harping on about Athens is over-reaching, pure and simple.
 
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