INTERNATIONAL OLYMPIC Committee president Jacques Rogge has said that London has done “a great job” to prepare for next year’s Olympics, with nearly nine out of every 10 venues completed, though doubts persist about the city’s transport system.
Declaring himself “a happy man”, the IOC chief, who attended a series of events in London yesterday, culminating in an open-air celebration in Trafalgar Square last night, said: “The operational readiness is extremely high, the spending is on budget and on time.”
Pointedly mentioning the 2004 Athens Olympics, which were plagued by problems, Mr Rogge said London is “on a par” with Sydney in 2000 and Beijing in 2008. “Both of them were fabulous games, so this is a good omen for London,” he said.
The aquatics centre in the Olympic Park in east London, which is likely to become one of the city’s iconic buildings, was officially unveiled yesterday – yet another finished on time.
Politicians defended the cost of the games, which are now likely to cost up to a billion pounds less than the £9.4 billion budgeted — though this figure was three times the original sum put forward when Labour prime minister Tony Blair ordered a campaign to host the world’s biggest sporting event.
The opening of the aquatic centre, which has a curved roof made from Welsh steel, has provoked much admiration. Designed by architect Zaha Hadid, it cost £250m to build, three times the original budget.
In elegiac mood, London mayor Boris Johnson, who faces an election battle before the games, said: “Is it not mind-blowing? It is an architectural poem: it’s a sinuous wave of beauty. That water looks good enough to drink. It is gin-clear.”
More than 3.5 million tickets for the games have been sold, with another million to be sold early next year, but only to those already registered with the London Olympics. Mr Rogge backed the decision to sell them by lottery.
Acknowledging it disappointed many people, he said: “That’s the cruelty of the lottery system. But a lottery system is an open, transparent and fair one. It was so oversubscribed that people are bound to be disappointed.”
Meanwhile, concerns persist that London’s transport system will struggle to cope with commuters, a million visitors and London’s population of games fans, despite new train lines to Stratford in East London that will travel every 20 seconds at peak times.
The concerns centre on the impact of the Olympics on the city’s financial district and surrounding areas, where businesses employing up to 500,000 people are already in discussions with Transport for London.
Foreign Office official Andrew Mitchell said it was intended to reduce commuter numbers by 20 per cent from the normal July and August levels next year, partly through teleworking, changed shift patterns and holidays.
