Russian Winter Olympics

knedlicky

arran77 wrote:

Overshadowed for me by their appalling attitude to human rights

k-dog wrote:

It's not like the $50Bn could have been used for anything useful in that part of the world...

Putin’s Olympic Party may have hidden the problems and injustices in Russia, but one idea behind Sochi was exactly the same as that the UK government promoted with the London Olympics – unite the nation, increase national pride, greet the Olympics as a national tonic, and hopefully cause a fresh start on the way to economic recovery – and in the UK some would argue the London Olympics made little difference in that direction and the money, about half what Putin paid out, could also have been put to better use.
(Part of the difference in cost between London and Sochi was the vast improvements made to Sochi's power, communication and transport facilities, to economically help the area - much greater improvements than what London got)

Eitherway, I think the World Cup in South Africa and proposed World Cup and Olympics in Brazil, both lands with great poverty and crime problems, are much better subjects for criticism of expense.

knedlicky

adamfo wrote:

The main stadium was designed by the London office of an American architectural practice. The special effects lead contactor was British.

The closing ceremony was arranged and choreographied by a Swiss theatre director, Daniele Pasca.
Also, all the camera set-up and camera work at the ski and snowboard events was done by the Swiss (which I thought very good but haven’t noticed praise anywhere, despite it being essential to TV enjoyment of the Olympics).

knedlicky

Pross wrote:

Surely Russia had existing resorts that could have been developed into an Olympic standard resort and where they didn't have to freeze last year's snow to ensure they had somewhere to ski?

Krasnaya Polyana, where the ski and snowboard events took place, is one of Russia’s main half-a-dozen skiing resorts, and the one nearest a large town (Sochi) and facilities like airport, train station, etc. So Sochi was actually the best place in Russia, not to mention its setting on the Black Sea and its picturesque parts.
It was unfortunate about the temperatures in the skiing area, but also unusual, like the recent excessive rain in the UK.

Pross wrote:

Incidentally, I drove into Cheltenham the other day and discovered it was twinned with Sochi. Seems an odd pairing!

Sochi a spa town, so is Cheltenham.

knedlicky

Pross wrote:

k-dog wrote:

^ You mean like this?
http://myfox8.com/2014/02/22/eerie-phot ... cs-venues/
(although to be fair they did have a war fairly soon after)

That's so sad to see but as you say it's just a reflection of what happened to the rest of the country. I believe they recently got the ice rink back up as Torville and Dean performed there to celebrate their 30th anniversary but even that isn't to its former glory.
I see Sochi ending up like that but just from lack of use.

thegreatdivide wrote:

in 10 years the place will be popping up on one of these “exploring abandoned buildings” websites.

I'm not as pessimistic - the Olympic stadium will be used as a football stadium, in 2014 as a venue during the 2018 World Cup, and I can imagine other facilities will be put to summer sport use; Sochi has always been known as a summer sports centre, for tennis especially. Also, for at least the next 7 years there will be a Formula 1 race there and they’ll use some of the facilities.
Krasnaya Polyana now has proper training facilities for Russian skiers and snowboarders – in the past the Russians mainly trained outside Russia, e.g. the biathletes in Bavaria.

mr_goo

Thoroughly enjoyed the whole two weeks. Was good to get up in morning and watch some different sports whilst having breakfast.
Thought the figure skating was excellent, but the enjoyed the snowboarding cross most of all.
Didn't cross my mind once or temper my enjoyment that it cost £bns to stage. The organisation and the spectacle of it bodes well for when they have the World Cup in 2018.

VTech

Mr Goo wrote:

Thoroughly enjoyed the whole two weeks. Was good to get up in morning and watch some different sports whilst having breakfast.
Thought the figure skating was excellent, but the enjoyed the snowboarding cross most of all.
Didn't cross my mind once or temper my enjoyment that it cost £bns to stage. The organisation and the spectacle of it bodes well for when they have the World Cup in 2018.

Ahhhh, my faith is restored by a fellow human enjoying the good without trying to view the bad.

I couldn't agree more with everything you wrote.
My crunchy nut were not the same this morning, that's for sure.

MattC59

I'm suprised that no one has mentioned the fact that Sochi is where Putin holidays, and that its been reported that the massive investment in the resort was largely unnecessary but was down to that.

adamfo

knedlicky wrote:

arran77 wrote:

Overshadowed for me by their appalling attitude to human rights

k-dog wrote:

It's not like the $50Bn could have been used for anything useful in that part of the world...

Putin’s Olympic Party may have hidden the problems and injustices in Russia, but one idea behind Sochi was exactly the same as that the UK government promoted with the London Olympics – unite the nation, increase national pride, greet the Olympics as a national tonic, and hopefully cause a fresh start on the way to economic recovery – and in the UK some would argue the London Olympics made little difference in that direction and the money, about half what Putin paid out, could also have been put to better use.
(Part of the difference in cost between London and Sochi was the vast improvements made to Sochi's power, communication and transport facilities, to economically help the area - much greater improvements than what London got)

Eitherway, I think the World Cup in South Africa and proposed World Cup and Olympics in Brazil, both lands with great poverty and crime problems, are much better subjects for criticism of expense.

The London games cost $14.5 billion USD. To put that into some sort of perspective, the 2014 UK foreign aid budget is $18 billion USD. The Sochi games cost $50 billion +

rick_chasey

MattC59 wrote:

I'm suprised that no one has mentioned the fact that Sochi is where Putin holidays, and that its been reported that the massive investment in the resort was largely unnecessary but was down to that.

S'where he's from so it's been getting preferential treatment for a while.

VTech

Rick Chasey wrote:

MattC59 wrote:

I'm suprised that no one has mentioned the fact that Sochi is where Putin holidays, and that its been reported that the massive investment in the resort was largely unnecessary but was down to that.

S'where he's from so it's been getting preferential treatment for a while.

What do you think other people think of the UK and London ?

arran77

VTech wrote:

Rick Chasey wrote:

MattC59 wrote:

I'm suprised that no one has mentioned the fact that Sochi is where Putin holidays, and that its been reported that the massive investment in the resort was largely unnecessary but was down to that.

S'where he's from so it's been getting preferential treatment for a while.

What do you think other people think of the UK and London ?

How do you mean VTech?

thegreatdivide

adamfo wrote:

knedlicky wrote:

arran77 wrote:

Overshadowed for me by their appalling attitude to human rights

k-dog wrote:

It's not like the $50Bn could have been used for anything useful in that part of the world...

Putin’s Olympic Party may have hidden the problems and injustices in Russia, but one idea behind Sochi was exactly the same as that the UK government promoted with the London Olympics – unite the nation, increase national pride, greet the Olympics as a national tonic, and hopefully cause a fresh start on the way to economic recovery – and in the UK some would argue the London Olympics made little difference in that direction and the money, about half what Putin paid out, could also have been put to better use.
(Part of the difference in cost between London and Sochi was the vast improvements made to Sochi's power, communication and transport facilities, to economically help the area - much greater improvements than what London got)

Eitherway, I think the World Cup in South Africa and proposed World Cup and Olympics in Brazil, both lands with great poverty and crime problems, are much better subjects for criticism of expense.

The London games cost $14.5 billion USD. To put that into some sort of perspective, the 2014 UK foreign aid budget is $18 billion USD. The Sochi games cost $50 billion +

And with it being held in one of the most corrupt countries in the world how much money went into pockets? I would guess at least 75%.

For $50 billion+ you could have had an opening ceremony in space - but instead you got some ropey snowflakes that didn't work.

VTech

arran77 wrote:

VTech wrote:

Rick Chasey wrote:

MattC59 wrote:

I'm suprised that no one has mentioned the fact that Sochi is where Putin holidays, and that its been reported that the massive investment in the resort was largely unnecessary but was down to that.

S'where he's from so it's been getting preferential treatment for a while.

What do you think other people think of the UK and London ?

How do you mean VTech?

I mean that to other countries, people think that we are corrupt or at least the government are in the way London gets preferential treatment. It's always been that way and although it doesn't bother me, it is a shame that we too are also burdened with corrupt officials.

Btw, our Olympic Games didn't consider the land purchased around London to host the games. That amounted to staggering sums.

arran77

But surely it's just logical that the capital of a country be the host for an event such as the Olympics?

VTech

Yes. That is logical but when infrastructure is abundant within such a small region whilst other areas struggle with the scraps.
On a serious note I'm still upset at the missed runway at BHX so venting upset at yet another midland loss

arran77

Sure, other parts of the country might well have welcomed the opportunity to get a slice of the action but that would have no doubt come at massive additional cost to this country and for what benefit?

VTech

arran77 wrote:

Sure, other parts of the country might well have welcomed the opportunity to get a slice of the action but that would have no doubt come at massive additional cost to this country and for what benefit?

Massive savings actually, the land purchases in London were overpaid to a huge factor.

arran77

There is that but at least London has the infrastructure that was needed. Would there not have had to be massive investment in infrastructure for other pats of the country?

VTech

I think the real point is that it doesn't matter who organises it, where it is and how much it costs, these are great exhibitions of what can be achieved and I felt proud of London last year and loved the Russian Olympics so it's all relative as most people wished they had the gain which can't work for all

I had a party at my house over Xmas and told the wife how much the budget was yet she too spend treble what was planned so it's no new thing for us all to have one price and it end up another

arran77

Absolutely, regardless of where in the country it was it made you feel proud to see the Olympics in your own country and showing the world what we can do.

That proud feeling is often sadly missing from modern Britain, just look back to this country during the industrial revolution, how different are attitudes today :roll:

knedlicky

adamfo wrote:

The London games cost $14.5 billion USD. The Sochi games cost $50 billion +

The UK government’s official figure for the cost of the London Olympics was almost $15 billion, however this figure was primarily for construction, etc, and excluded over $4 billion for ancillary costs - such as legacy issues, legal bills, buying land, governmental costs and also paying councils throughout the UK for the Olympic torch relays.
Total was therefore more like $19 million.
Nobody yet knows the real cost for Sochi, the estimates range from $37 billion to $51 billion - but people tend to use the high end figure, because whatever their argument, it’s more impressive.

knedlicky

arran77 wrote:

But surely it's just logical that the capital of a country be the host for an event such as the Olympics?

Logical???
The last Winter Olympics based at a capital were Oslo, in 1952.
Only about two-thirds of Summer Olympics are at capitals.

knedlicky

Rick Chasey wrote:

MattC59 wrote:

I'm suprised that no one has mentioned the fact that Sochi is where Putin holidays, and that its been reported that the massive investment in the resort was largely unnecessary but was down to that.

S'where he's from so it's been getting preferential treatment for a while.

Putin’s holiday home on the Black Sea is about 100 miles NW of Sochi. All the Olympic events were within 25 miles of Sochi.

Even if Putin were to choose Sochi for a holiday, he would only be one of about 4 million other people who holiday or day trip there each year, which makes it very similar to Bournemouth, both in population of conurbation (350,000) and number of visitors. And anyone who’s been there in the past would know the transport improvements were very necessary.

As for whether Putin’s from Sochi - he’s from St. Petersburg, 1200 miles north of Sochi.

knedlicky

VTech wrote:

I think the real point is that it doesn't matter who organises it, where it is and how much it costs, these are great exhibitions of what can be achieved

This

Pross

knedlicky wrote:

adamfo wrote:

The London games cost $14.5 billion USD. The Sochi games cost $50 billion +

The UK government’s official figure for the cost of the London Olympics was almost $15 billion, however this figure was primarily for construction, etc, and excluded over $4 billion for ancillary costs - such as legacy issues, legal bills, buying land, governmental costs and also paying councils throughout the UK for the Olympic torch relays.
Total was therefore more like $19 million.
Nobody yet knows the real cost for Sochi, the estimates range from $37 billion to $51 billion - but people tend to use the high end figure, because whatever their argument, it’s more impressive.

So even on the best scenario (from a Russian point of view) the cost was double and without wishing to downplay the winter games (which I have always loved) they are very much the poor relation and a much smaller event than the summer equivalent in terms of number of events, number of competitors, number of venues required, amount of people attending etc. The cost of Sochi needs to be compared against the likes of Vancouver ($8.7 billion) or Torino (around $4 billion)

In addition, you obviously know more about Russia than I do but I just can't see the 'legacy' from Sochi being as beneficial (especially in non-sporting terms). As an example, my sister now works in a fantastic new school built on the Olympic park and there is a lot of (relatively) low cost accommodation now available in the area for key workers.

arran77

Pross wrote:

The cost of Sochi needs to be compared against the likes of Vancouver ($8.7 billion) or Torino (around $4 billion)

Very true, a summer and winter games are not the same thing by any means.

knedlicky wrote:

Nobody yet knows the real cost for Sochi, the estimates range from $37 billion to $51 billion

That's the key, no one does yet know but does appear to have been a massively expensive games in comparison to the likes of Vancouver :shock:

bompington

knedlicky wrote:

I have seen the future and it works!

knedlicky

bompington wrote:

knedlicky wrote:

I have seen the future and it works!