USOC officials in town today and Saturday to assess Washington as the U.S. candidate for the 2012 Summer Games are being told that the opening ceremony of the Games, should Washington win the bid, will be held at a new Olympic stadium instead of the national Mall. But concurrent celebrations will be held on the Mall and at Baltimore’s Inner Harbor.
Dan Knise, president of Washington DC 2012 said, “it was driven primarily by logistics. We started digging into the detail of how you move 300,000 to 500,000 people on the Mall and at the same time, you’re keeping 10,000 to 12,000 athletes sequestered somewhere”.
He added, “there had been some informal feedback that the IOC would prefer to light the torch in the stadium. We still want to use the Mall as a big celebration site. We’re not going to lose those ideas”.
Although Washington got high marks during an initial visit last year, the new plan is one of several changes the USOC task force will examine during the next two days.
In April, Washington 2012 abandoned the idea of spreading the Games throughout “hub” cities and instead proposed an Olympic Sports Complex at the current site of RFK Stadium on a cleaned-up Anacostia River.
The complex would be the site of nine sports, the new stadium, an Olympic plaza, the media centre and various support facilities.
Knise said, “one thing we were missing before that we didn’t realize we were missing – we were missing a heart and soul of the Games. I think we’ve created it right here. This is the signature work in our plan”.
Of Washington’s chances Knise said, “I’d like to always think I’m in second and work harder. Do I think we have a strong case to make? Heck, yeah. This is a very solid plan”.
Regarding hosting the 2012 Games, Knise realizes that the world might not be eager to give another Olympics to the United States in the near future despite the success of the Salt Lake Winter Games.
He said, “we’ve got to be in this for the long haul. We should not be in this unless we have the stamina to stick with it until 2016 and even potentially 2020. But I think 2012 looks better post-Salt Lake than before Salt Lake”.
