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Australian 2032 Olympic Bid Boosted By Successful Gold Coast 2018 Commonwealth Games


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Informal meetings have been held on the Gold Coast this week to discuss a possible Queensland, Australia bid for the 2032 Olympic Games, the Courier-Mail has reported.  International Olympic Committee (IOC) officials on hand to celebrate the Gold Coast Commonwealth Games were reportedly “impressed” by their outstanding success. The IOC officials warned, however, that the federal […]

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This could work using infrastructure in both Brisbane and Gold Coast. I assume most of the CWG venues would be used for their Olympic counterparts. One area of speculation, the oft-troubled Olympic Stadium. Metricon Stadium was praised for its athletics track during the CWGs and there's already talk that Gold Coast could be a future IAAF World Championship host. In athletics mode the stadium seats maybe 50,000? Would that be acceptable to the IOC in an era where prospective hosts are dropping like flies?

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While I concede that South East Queensland is fully capable of hosting the Olympics, and would do it well, I would hope the AOC opens up a domestic competition for the rights for 2032. Its a little presumptions of Beattie and Co to ignore the presence of Sydney, Melbourne or even Perth. 

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2 hours ago, baron-pierreIV said:

Yes, but would the Brisbane/Gold Coast climate in September/October be conducive to Olympic conditions?  Doing it this time (April) would not be acceptable to the IOC. 

The average temperature's only a couple of degrees cooler than in April, and as a bonus, the number of rainy days is usually lower.

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8 hours ago, baron-pierreIV said:

Yes, but would the Brisbane/Gold Coast climate in September/October be conducive to Olympic conditions?  Doing it this time (April) would not be acceptable to the IOC. 

That’s exactly Brisbane’s/South Queensland’s ace in the pocket for being Oz’s next summer games bidder - they’re really the only big city that has a climate conducive to a summer games in the July-September window. They’re by far the most balmy and tropical of our major cities and have by far the mildest winters - by August-September they’re very pleasant. Sydney can’t really promise much warmth before when they did  it in 2000 in late September, and Melbourne has the coldest and longest of our winters - can still be chilly there up to late October. That’s the reason why John Coates says Brisbane is our only real shot at a future summer games.

Of course, some posters will say they’d always make an exception for Melbourne (maybe they would if they had no other option, but the IOC made a pretty heavy precedent when they turfed Dubai out for its suggested timing). And then there’s the argument that should it matter if a summer games is held in a cold and miserable season?

5 hours ago, JMarkSnow2012 said:

The average temperature's only a couple of degrees cooler than in April, and as a bonus, the number of rainy days is usually lower.

It’s funny, when they announced GC would be in April, my first comment here was that it would be close to cyclone season. And they really did I only miss the tail end of a few cyclones by the skin of their teeth.

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3 hours ago, Barcelona_'92 said:

September/October would not be acceptable either due to NBC’s demand that the Games be held in July or August.

Err...NBC can go **** themselves. Terrestrial TV will be long gone as a viable concern by then. Amazon, Google and all the other online broadcasting providers will be owning the Olympics by this time.

Queensland should go after a World Track and Field Champs and dare I say it...Another Commonwealth Games, this time Sunshine Coast or even further up north such as Cairns for the interim.

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The problem is not just NBC, but also all of the sporting federations which have their own event calendars. IAAF world athletics championships are always hosted in August or September, for example, even if it means athletes running in 39 C temperatures in Qatar next year.

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Point of Queensland is that they can host in July/August isn't it? (PS - have the IOC locked the dates now so the opening ceremony is always on the last Friday in July?) Whatever, I know it's only 32 years from Sydney but I think they should have a great chance. Australia is probably the world's most reliable country for hosting stuff like this & while interest is hot, the IOC would be mad to not consider this strongly. 

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14 minutes ago, yoshi said:

Point of Queensland is that they can host in July/August isn't it? 

Exactly. A quick check shows Brissie’s average July and August temps are 21C and 22C respectively (with an average of four days and three days of rain respectively). Which checking back corresponds pretty well with what London had back in 2012 (but with less rain). In other words, it’s still possible to be shorts and t-short weather by day.

Also, by comparison, Melbourne’s average is 14C and 15C for the same months, and Sydney’s 17C and 18C.

 

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^Brisbane may have the ‘ideal weather’ between the IOC preferred window of July 15th-Aug 31st now, but what else does it have going for it?

From my understanding (even according to a couple of other Aussie members here) Brisbane would need an immense amount of work to do bcuz they don’t have nearly as many of the facilities that are needed as say, well Melbourne (& before someone talks about these 2018 CWG’s facilities, how many of them are of Olympic caliber & capicity? Not to mention that the GC is still 50 miles away from Brisbane) in this era of the cities running away from even bidding for the Olympics due to the massive cost, would the IOC even dare these days to go on another mega spending-spree project when the topic about money & the Olympics in the same sentence is super sensative these days.

Melbourne has even been dubbed by some as the “L.A. of Australia” (a comparison that someone around here I’m sure really appreciates :D), & ready to step in at a moments notice. Not to mention, that Brisbane is really not a global city. Melbourne is even pushing it, but it is  “the sports capital of the Southern Hemisphere” which would complement an Olympic bid from them. As a matter a fact, I’ve heard a regular Aussie member here describe Brisbane as a “big city backwater town”.

And about the IOC perhaps changing it’s dates (or “not”) now, well if Melbourne would happened to be the only bidder left, since “that’s not an inconceivable scenario these days”, then that’s what they would do. Let remember how the IOC last year amended their own “rules” to allow 2024 & 2028 to be awarded together (& perhaps even doing the same for 2026 & 2030), when many were saying before-hand that it couldn’t be done. So let’s not hone in on the date matter like it’s somehow set in stone now, cuz when it comes to the IOC, if it benefits them or something is inconvenient for them, then they’ll change whatever they need to change to make whatever favorable for them.

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1 hour ago, FYI said:

And about the IOC perhaps changing it’s dates (or “not”) now, well if Melbourne would happened to be the only bidder left, since “that’s not an inconceivable scenario these days”, then that’s what they would do. Let remember how the IOC last year amended their own “rules” to allow 2024 & 2028 to be awarded together (& perhaps even doing the same for 2026 & 2030), when many were saying before-hand that it couldn’t be done.

They did that to secure the future of the Olympics and ensure that both Europe and North America would have the summer games in the next couple of decades. An Olympics in April would be the opposite: the IOC, the sporting federations and the broadcasters would all lose money compared to what they would get from a northern hemisphere summer Olympics. Choosing a games in spring would bring the IOC less rather than more financial security.

I am not saying that a Melbourne Olympics either will not or should not happen. But in the past when the IOC has broken its own rules it has done so primarily out of self interest rather than magnanimity.

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^NO where did I say about an April Olympics in Melbourne, though. A Melbourne Olympics in late September/early October, (much like Sydney 2000 - & which BTW, would still be very comparable to April’s weather), would work just fine.

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Brisbane might not be the IOC's ideal A-list city, but Australia is a known entity that has staged two excellent Summer Games plus two highly successful Commonwealth Games since 2000.  The IOC can have high confidence that any Games in Australia will have strong organization and full stadiums.

Brisbane and Gold Coast are closer together than the ice and mountain clusters at several recent Winter Games.  While not all of the venues are currently Olympic-caliber, several have the potential to be upgraded for the Games at relatively low cost.  The Queensland Athletics Centre in Brisbane currently seats about 50,000 and could probably be upgraded with temporary seating to get to 65,000-70,000 for the ceremonies and athletics.  Either the Brisbane or Gold Coast Aquatics Centre could easily host diving and water polo as is, with the other being upgraded for swimming or a temporary pool built for swimming.  The Brisbane Entertainment Centre could be used for one of the major indoor sports, and Brisbane has a large Convention Centre that could house several sports.  An Olympic-caliber velodrome already exists.  The Games would be more spread out than the IOC is used to for the Summer Games, and the venue capacities might be a bit lower, but they'd be very successful and relatively cost-controlled.

I'm sure the IOC would prefer a strong European bid for 2032, but in the absence of Europe, the IOC could do a lot worse than Brisbane, especially if their only other options are another Games in Asia (Shanghai) or cities like Doha and Baku.

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The United States is also a very well-known entity which has hosted several successful Olympic Games (the most of any other country, actually). However, that alone does not mean that any city in the U.S. can host the Games effectively - hence, why we’re headed back to L.A. for a third time in 2028 instead of Boston, for example. 

Before Brisbane can even be the bid city, I seriously doubt that the AOC won’t have a domestic process first & that Melbourne won’t put up a good fight for the nod TBW. I’m still not convinced that Brisbane can do it at a “relatively cost-controlled” effort. Not when you have Melbourne with virtually everything that’s needed already, in the picture, & when also some Aussie members themselves have outlined Brisbane’s major challenges before. 

What I find kind of funny & ironic here now, is when South Africa (before they finally called it quits) was still being talked about as a future possibility, many were quite vehement that it had to be Cape Town or Johannesburg for the bid city bcuz they were the top-tier cities of South Africa, even though they were the cities that needed the most work, & despite Durban having the ideal weather of them all between July 15th-Aug 31st. Not to mention the Olympic-ready Stadium that Durban has & their sports precinct that could’ve housed several of the sports. So here we are, Brisbane is Australia’s “Duban” (another comparison for someone :lol:), yet all of the sudden some people have the opposite view here. Go figure.

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After witnessing in person how a large sporting event works, i'm honestly not sure on Brisbane's chances. A lot of work needs to be done.

They need a big stadium. Suncorp Stadium can't really be renovated to double it's capacity, QEII/QSAC is too outdated to be renovated in my opinion. So they'd need to build a massive stadium somewhere that's accessible. After reading through the Brisbane 1992 Olympic bid book, I still think Boondall would be the best area for most of the venues as there is a lot of land with massive potential and the Olympic Village could be built there too. A new stadium would cost near $1 billion so maybe they would try to fix up QSAC but I would like to see what they propose.

Another big issue is the transportation system, our rail system isn't great, it wasn't great for the Comm Games and that was seen by Queensland Rail pushing for people travelling to work to find alternatives. However, Brisbane is looking at a light rail system or a cross river rail system, not sure which one is going ahead at this point but they are implementing this irregardless of an Olympic bid which is good. Sydney appears to have a great rail system to get to Homebush whereas our rail system isn't anywhere near that level. 

Brisbane would be the smallest host city by population I believe with a bit over 2 million people. However, it's one of the largest cities in the world by area which is a positive. Sharing events with the Gold Coast could be a benefit but not sure what the IOC thinks nowadays about joint bids, they weren't a big fan in the past but perhaps the lack of bidders in recent years may have changed their mind. The distance between Brisbane and the Gold Coast would be a real issue as well, took about 1.5 hours to get from where I live in Brisbane to the main stadium at Carrara. 

The weather is the biggest thing Brisbane has going for it, that appears to be one of the more important things for the IOC so I can't see them allowing a Sydney or Melbourne bid late in the year. Never understood why people suggest Perth as an option, anything Brisbane lacks, Perth lacks even more. They don't have potential cities to co-share events with whereas Brisbane has the Gold Coast, Perth has a smaller population and they haven't hosted anything really in decades whilst Brisbane at least had the Goodwill Games in 2001..

If the AOC is going to go for a 2032 bid I believe it'll be Brisbane but that doesn't mean I think they'll win.

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12 minutes ago, Olympic Fan Darcy said:

After witnessing in person how a large sporting event works, i'm honestly not sure on Brisbane's chances. A lot of work needs to be done.

They need a big stadium. Suncorp Stadium can't really be renovated to double it's capacity, QEII/QSAC is too outdated to be renovated in my opinion. So they'd need to build a massive stadium somewhere that's accessible. After reading through the Brisbane 1992 Olympic bid book, I still think Boondall would be the best area for most of the venues as there is a lot of land with massive potential and the Olympic Village could be built there too. A new stadium would cost near $1 billion so maybe they would try to fix up QSAC but I would like to see what they propose.

Boondall for the most part is protected wetland - it won't happen.

Much opf QSAC/QEII is unusable - which is why at recent AC/DC and Guns N' Roses shows the top of the back stands were not on sale. The stands are decrepit an to be honest quite unsafe.

14 minutes ago, Olympic Fan Darcy said:

Another big issue is the transportation system, our rail system isn't great, it wasn't great for the Comm Games and that was seen by Queensland Rail pushing for people travelling to work to find alternatives. However, Brisbane is looking at a light rail system or a cross river rail system, not sure which one is going ahead at this point but they are implementing this irregardless of an Olympic bid which is good. Sydney appears to have a great rail system to get to Homebush whereas our rail system isn't anywhere near that level. 

This is a major issue - as I am sure you know getting home from a concert at Boondall is awful - there are no late trains if a show runs over and getting out of the carpark can take hours.  QSAC/QEII has little real transport links besides road - too far to walk from Banoon and the walk from Garden City is a crapshoot at best.

If there was room to expand the Gabba (and the river tunnel ever got built) we may have a feasible solution.  But that is not the case.

 

Bottom line - Brisbane does not have suitable venues of the required capacity available right now.  There will be billions of dollars of upgrades/complete rebuilds needed.  We can't even get a single new arena built let alone multiple arenas, stadia etc.  Public transport is better thanks to the busways - but they only go so far.  The roads are a mess.  The trains are crap. The ferrys are pretty much there for window dressing.

Brisbane has the weather and friendly locals.  That is about it at this point. Anything else is delusional political hogwash.

Melbourne can host an Olympics.  Sydney could with a sizeable budget.  Perth may be better suited than Brisbane now they have the new adaptable stadium, new arena and expanded convention facilities.  Either way a Brisbane Games will only come to pass in the near future if the IOC is faced with a Beijing VS Almaty situation and we can negotiate them down to a small scale Games.

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1 hour ago, thatsnotmypuppy said:

Boondall for the most part is protected wetland - it won't happen.

What was the plan in 1992? Was it not protected back then but it is now or were the Govt willing to give land up? There's also an abundance of land near the airport but not sure how close they'd want to get + it's slightly far from the CBD and from Belmont (shooting) and Chandler (cycling). 

1 hour ago, thatsnotmypuppy said:

Much opf QSAC/QEII is unusable - which is why at recent AC/DC and Guns N' Roses shows the top of the back stands were not on sale. The stands are decrepit an to be honest quite unsafe.

This is a major issue - as I am sure you know getting home from a concert at Boondall is awful - there are no late trains if a show runs over and getting out of the carpark can take hours.  QSAC/QEII has little real transport links besides road - too far to walk from Banoon and the walk from Garden City is a crapshoot at best.

If there was room to expand the Gabba (and the river tunnel ever got built) we may have a feasible solution.  But that is not the case.

QSAC might as well be knocked down, as you said, unusable and in the middle of suburbia. Local residents would not want it to be used as the main hub. Boondall needs a lot of work too as it's over 30 years old now. Serviced by one train station with only 2 lines, don't think it could even be extended/upgraded to have another line as most of the Shorncliffe line is cramped as is and couldn't fit another track. I also don't believe buses go to Boondall even on event nights so it's poorly managed. Only 4,000 parks on site as well. 

2 hours ago, thatsnotmypuppy said:

Bottom line - Brisbane does not have suitable venues of the required capacity available right now.  There will be billions of dollars of upgrades/complete rebuilds needed.  We can't even get a single new arena built let alone multiple arenas, stadia etc.  Public transport is better thanks to the busways - but they only go so far.  The roads are a mess.  The trains are crap. The ferrys are pretty much there for window dressing.

Brisbane has the weather and friendly locals.  That is about it at this point. Anything else is delusional political hogwash.

Melbourne can host an Olympics.  Sydney could with a sizeable budget.  Perth may be better suited than Brisbane now they have the new adaptable stadium, new arena and expanded convention facilities.  Either way a Brisbane Games will only come to pass in the near future if the IOC is faced with a Beijing VS Almaty situation and we can negotiate them down to a small scale Games.

Yep. A bid currently isn't feasible, fortunately they have some time til 2023 before bidding opens should they want to go for 2032. As I said though, I can't see them winning or even coming close. They do have a couple venues ready but only the small ones. The Tennis centre at Tennyson is ready to go, there's a lot of land for another arena should they want to build another one. Cycling at Chandler, shooting at Belmont have been upgraded for the Comm Games. Suncorp Stadium could host some Rugby Sevens but yeah they need a lot of work.

I also can't imagine the government wanting to build an Aquatic centre in Brisbane and a Leisure centre for Badminton/Wrestling/Weightlifting when they just built brand new ones at the Gold Coast.

Melbourne and Sydney can host a games for sure but depends on whether the IOC want to change their rules on the hosting period. After the recent bidding disasters, they might be open to it. 

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Agree...QEII is finished. I'm amazed it lasted as long as it has, and was always criticised for being in that awful windy spot. Check out the Opening of the CWGs as an example. Those bleacher stands were never meant to stay after the 1982 Commonwealth Games...But they did.

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On 4/18/2018 at 1:07 AM, stryker said:

Does Brisbane even have a need for an Olympic Stadium? It doesn't appear so. Metricon Stadium hosting athletics with Suncorp Stadium hosting the ceremonies? Seems like that would be there best bet.

Suncorp has a max capacity of around 52,500 which is way too short for an Olympic Stadium. Rio's stadium was around 75,000, London was 80,000, Beijing was 90,000 etc. And there's no room for Suncorp to be expanded as it's pretty much surrounded by roads etc. Brisbane would have to build a new stadium which if i'm being honest it doesn't really need. 

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2 hours ago, Olympic Fan Darcy said:

Suncorp has a max capacity of around 52,500 which is way too short for an Olympic Stadium. Rio's stadium was around 75,000, London was 80,000, Beijing was 90,000 etc. And there's no room for Suncorp to be expanded as it's pretty much surrounded by roads etc. Brisbane would have to build a new stadium which if i'm being honest it doesn't really need. 

Spot on.

The Gabba can't be expanded due to the entire area being built up, Suncorp Stadium is similarly hemmed in on all sides.  QSAC could be redeveloped and will most likely be the centrepiece of any Brisbane bid - transport and local residents be damned. 

One potential option is building a new stadium (temporary or otherwise) at the Sleeman Sports Centre in Chandler - there is definitely space there and could involve the conversion of the old dumping ground.  The issue again would be accessibility.  There is no rail nearby and the bus system during the Comm Games wasn't great.  They could expand the aquatic centre and along with the velodrome and BMX venue could in theory have an Olympic Park - on a smaller scale.

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10 hours ago, Olympic Fan Darcy said:

Suncorp has a max capacity of around 52,500 which is way too short for an Olympic Stadium. Rio's stadium was around 75,000, London was 80,000, Beijing was 90,000 etc. And there's no room for Suncorp to be expanded as it's pretty much surrounded by roads etc. Brisbane would have to build a new stadium which if i'm being honest it doesn't really need. 

If that's the case then Brisbane is a no go, unless they can somehow convince the IOC to hold the ceremonies in Sydney. The temporary stadium idea is a failed concept when considering the size of a SOG stadium.

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