In a video conference with the International Olympic Committee’s executive board, Salt Lake organizers warned of trouble ahead in two areas that have plagued recent editions of the Games, traffic jams and computer problems.
Committee head Mitt Romney told reporters, “you can be sure we will have problems. It is virtually certain that information technology will have software challenged (and) that we will have transportation glitches”, he said.
Bad weather will likely combine with heavy traffic to create delays on Interstate 80, the steep highway that climbs from Salt Lake City to Park City. Organizers are most concerned about highway conditions Feb. 12, the busiest day of the Olympics.
SLOC chief operating officer Fraser Bullock said, Feb. 12 will bring “our highest load on I-80. We’re hoping to get the word out to people to car pool, avoid trips and be patient with us. We will have glitches in transportation”.
Romney and Bullock said Utah’s ability to react quickly to the problems will determine how bad things get.
Also, Olympic organizers are working to perfect a lightning-fast computer network to instantly calculate the times and scores of athletes at 10 venues and ship those statistics around the globe.
The system showed signs of trouble during three days of simulated Olympic competition in October. That’s when computer applications crashed, network segments lost their connections and emergency repairs worked slowly.
