Despite the support it received from the Swiss Olympic Association, Zurich has dropped its bid for the 2014 Winter Olympic Games.
City authorities said Tuesday that the decision was prompted by concerns over the expected costs and lack of public support.
In a statement city authorities said, “the current public finance position does not permit this sort of commitment in terms of infrastructure, security, general organization or deficit guarantees”.
Also, officials said public support for the project would have to be “convincingly secured” by 2007 – when the International Olympic Committee (IOC) selects the 2014 host city. The city said a Zurich referendum would have to show overwhelming support by vote time in 2007, if the IOC was to consider awarding the Games to Switzerland.
The statement continued, “from today’s perspective, the risk of rejection is judged as too high”.
The decision was taken following talks involving representatives of the city of Zurich, three cantons, and the Federal Office for Sport.
It’s apparent from Tuesday’s statement that talks between the various interested parties failed to reach any agreement on how to share the estimated costs.
Hans-Peter Burkhard, chief of the Zurich cantonal (state) office of economy and work said, “Winter Games cost a lot of money, and we cannot spend money that we don’t have”. He said Zurich was particularly concerned about the cost of security and construction projects.
A spokesman for the Swiss Olympic Association regretted the decision which he said would have had every chance of meeting international acceptance. But he noted that Zurich had not ruled out involvement in a future bid, possible as early as 2018, but on a different funding basis.
Zurich authorities said any future Swiss bid to host the Winter Games should be led by the Olympic association with support from the proposed host city and the participating cantons. They said substantial federal support would be essential to any such bid, but added that the federal authorities could not play the lead role in the process.
