cjs2

WTF...why?

As to the most distant venue issue - Equestrian during Beijing 2008 was in Hong Kong!

Don't you think I know that? I was thinking, for one, about security costs. But there's a less direct tax on other resources used by people in-country, like transport and consular services, etc. - and symbolic value which has an impact for perceptions of nationals abroad, etc. It's hard to say that citizens of a host nation aren't invested in the games in a way that should give them some theoretical bases on which to claim nonrepresentation. It was precisely the fact that Atlanta showed a cheesy stereotype of the south, rather than its "vibrancy," that people were upset about.

I don't think larger locations necessarily make anything less spread out. Maybe they are no longer as spread out as Albertville, but clustering seems largely unavoidable. If PC's claim that everything is within 30 minutes is true, and doesn't lead to transport bottlenecks, great. But geographically, those games ARE spread out into various clusters. Ditto Vancouver - Whistler was an hour+ away from the city (Munich would have had the same issue). And despite the fact that a larger city could have theoretically concentrated venues, some in Vancouver, like the Richmond Olympic Oval, were located far from the downtown core, because cities are also crowded places and it's hard to find contiguous land for numerous ice venues that will make sense to retain far into the future. Obviously the preference is for clusters of venues, which is the only realistic option even for larger host cities. Annecy failed to learn this and remained too spread out a bid. There's nothing stopping a Zakopane bid from clustering venue locations rather than strewing them among nearby villages, though - if anything, smaller towns have more freedom to do this than hemmed-in urban areas.

Meeting the IOC's minimum quality threshold and being representative in a way that satisfies a wide constituency of people who are supposedly being represented by a games are two different things. I don't think Americans minded the fact that there was a regional focus so much as the fact that it wasn't even very flattering with regard to the region it purported to represent. Also, to the extent that country-level taxes foot the bill for part of nearly every Olympics, domestic viewers are not just passive viewers who get to watch an OC for free. They have invested in the symbolism of having a games in their backyard for a reason.

The politics of this are thorny. Olympic Games can be and often are seen as representing entire nations, despite vast regional differences. A good chunk of Canada had to be and was represented by the performances during the Vancouver OC, and even then, there were loud complains that the ceremonies shortchanged Quebecois culture and the French language in general. There was less official hand-wringing over Atlanta but many Americans were upset that the tacky Confederate pickup truck extravaganza didn't represent the country as a whole very well on the world stage.

Okay, but assuming the Lillehammer games are a gold standard, and there are plenty of places in the region around Zakopane to which venues can be spread out, and assuming that the winter games can't have become THAT much larger in the last 17 years, there has to be a chance for Zakopane. I mean, few debate that comparatively microscopic St. Moritz would be able to mount a superior bid...

Right, I understand that Gangneung will be hosting some events, but why does a WOG suddenly (post-Nagano) absolutely need to be in a larger city, or have a larger, big-brother city near the snow venues, for hockey and figure skating arenas? It's not as if Zakopane couldn't contain ice facilities. It's about the same size as Lillehammer and larger than Albertville.

Quebec City doesn't even have a vertical drop long enough but is constantly mentioned as a somehow-viable candidate. If Zakopane has the geography, creating a course in the near future should not be a problem. And explain why Krakow needs to be so close? Pyeongchang is, even by high speed rail, over an hour from Seoul, where most athletes would presumably arrive.

I'll repeat my question now that we've stopped obsessing over Sweden exclusively: Zakopane!?

Athan, that logo blasts the winner out of the water. So evocative of Picasso, Miro, and other Spanish artists...would definitely give London 2012's logo a run for its money as something unique, quirky, and yet actually not questionable or (to many) hideous.

Canada didn't just have home games advantage. There were also significant resources poured into training and preparation. Didn't you hear about the "own the podium" program? It didn't just have to do with loud fan support...

Anyone have any sense for how another Zakopane bid would do?

I pulled the language from Wikipedia but cited the more reputable sources that were footnoted there. The Urals don't exactly cover the entire line of the "boundary" (if you can even say one really exists) so there are legitimate questions about where one continent ends and the other begins in this area.

I don't think it's such an elementary question. According to Wikipedia: The sources cited include the 2011 National Geographic Atlas (p. 59) and the Miriam-Webster Geographical Dictionary.