Olympic sized promises, Olympic sized lies

kabayiri

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/37842354

Does anyone else remember how we were all told that 2012 Olympics would not only be a sporting success, but a financial success as well?

The 10 billion costs would be an investment. They even had a well paid Legacy team to ensure that maximum profit would be extracted from the buildings after the event.

Well, it seems like same old same old. An Olympic sporting stadium costing half a billion quid which is not fit for purpose as a football ground.

Are these huge projects always destined to cost more than planned, and fail to deliver afterwards?

Fortunately, West Ham won't suffer. They pay a pittance in rent.

michaels

No doubt the best return for taxpayers would have been to knock it down and build apartments...is that what we would have preferred?

kabayiri

michaels wrote: »

No doubt the best return for taxpayers would have been to knock it down and build apartments...is that what we would have preferred?

Maybe. We are always being told just how short London is of property.

West Ham would have redeveloped their stadium or moved anyway. All the other London clubs faced the same challenge.

The comparison with the commonwealth stadium now used by Manchester City is interesting.

The conversion cost to make it suitable for football was £30m. This cost was picked up by the football club.

antrobus

kabayiri wrote: »

...The 10 billion costs would be an investment. They even had a well paid Legacy team to ensure that maximum profit would be extracted from the buildings after the event.
..

£10 bn? It was only around £2.4 bn to begin with. That's Ken Livingstone for you.

theEnd

antrobus wrote: »

£10 bn? It was only around £2.4 bn to begin with. That's Ken Livingstone for you.

Cracking couple of weeks though.

[Deleted User]

theEnd wrote: »

Cracking couple of weeks though.

James Bond meets the Queen? Why not! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xW5abat5NEU

The opening and closing ceremonies were epic

stator

kabayiri wrote: »

Maybe. We are always being told just how short London is of property.

West Ham would have redeveloped their stadium or moved anyway. All the other London clubs faced the same challenge.

The comparison with the commonwealth stadium now used by Manchester City is interesting.

The conversion cost to make it suitable for football was £30m. This cost was picked up by the football club.

The Manchester stadium was designed to be converted into a football stadium from the beginning.
When they were planning the Olympic park none of the London FCs were interested in potentially buying and converting it, so they designed it to be converted into a small athletics stadium at the end of the games.
But after a few years they realised they (sport england or whoever) couldn't afford to keep an expensive athletics stadium and so they looked for other buyers. Some football clubs were interested but the stadium wasn't designed for football, so the conversion costs would be very expensive.
Each decision at the time was seen as the most sensible, unfortunately things change.
Knocking it down and selling the land would have been a viable option but none of the politicians like the idea of 'wasting' something so they'd rather spend more money 'converting' it.

bugslet

ringo_24601 wrote: »

James Bond meets the Queen? Why not! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xW5abat5NEU

The opening and closing ceremonies were epic

They were. Shame about the bit in between - *ducks*, not in London and I don't like sport.

kabayiri

stator wrote: »

The Manchester stadium was designed to be converted into a football stadium from the beginning.
When they were planning the Olympic park none of the London FCs were interested in potentially buying and converting it, so they designed it to be converted into a small athletics stadium at the end of the games.
But after a few years they realised they (sport england or whoever) couldn't afford to keep an expensive athletics stadium and so they looked for other buyers. Some football clubs were interested but the stadium wasn't designed for football, so the conversion costs would be very expensive.
Each decision at the time was seen as the most sensible, unfortunately things change.
Knocking it down and selling the land would have been a viable option but none of the politicians like the idea of 'wasting' something so they'd rather spend more money 'converting' it.

=> Moral of the story?

Put the Mancs in charge

Up here we still know about value for money.

kabayiri

antrobus wrote: »

£10 bn? It was only around £2.4 bn to begin with. That's Ken Livingstone for you.

A work colleague is good friends with someone who was involved as one of the contractors bidding for the work. This guy actually was involved in the presentation to the committee. All parties tendering had to do this.

It was pointed out very early on that the £2.4bn figure was unrealistic. (Even the missing VAT issue was mentioned). These are seasoned contractors used to bidding on projects across the world.

The response was that they had to effectively keep it zipped if they wanted to stay in the process.

The Olympics was a politically driven project from the start. I'm just surprised they pretended that the taxpayer would somehow make a profit.

[Seb Coe limited made a really good profit]

michaels

Anyone think that it is going to be any different with HS2, Hinkley C or LHR3? Dodgy business cases, massive cost overruns picked up by the taxpayer and big profits for the private sector builders and operators....