I was planning to write this up last night, honest! But I didn’t get to it, and the Herald beat me to the punch. No matter, it’s still a good story.
See, one thing everyone has been wondering – especially after the #MBTAfail of recent days – is how all those Olympic athletes, spectators, media, etc. are going to get around Boston in a timely fashion. After all, Boston traffic does have a nasty habit of locking up at the most inopportune moments.
Well, Boston 2024 has a fix (p. 13) for that: “Olympic Lanes.”
Olympic Lanes will connect venues and provide reliable, safe transport for the Olympic Fleet and spectator shuttles on a network of more than 55 km of dedicated roadway lanes.
55 km translates to about 33 miles, for the curious. So where are those 33 miles of “dedicated roadway lanes” going to come from? See page 56:
Two main highways comprising about half of the Olympic Network —I-90 and I-93 — will connect Boston-Logan International Airport to the Athletes’ Village, downtown hotels and the waterfront while providing the spine of the ORN for Boston 2024. A series of downtown arterials will provide permitted vehicles with dedicated connections between competition venues when active, the IBC/MPC and hotels.
Ohhhhkaaayyy. So we’re talking at least one lane in both directions on I-93, the same on the Turnpike, and a bunch of dedicated lanes on downtown roads well. What could go wrong?
Not to worry, though, Boston 2024 says we’re used to this kind of thing.
The city and the region have become accustomed to changes in roadway capacities as result of the significant investment in public works over the past two decades. As an example, in 2011, the accelerated replacement of 14 bridges along I-93 north of Boston severely restricted capacity along the corridor for every weekend of the summer. During that project, traffic reductions/diversions of about 50 percent of typical summer demands were achieved through a comprehensive transportation demand management and regional traffic management plan. A similar plan would be put in place to mitigate the impacts of the Olympic Lanes associated with the I-93 corridor during the Games.
In other words, we’re used to traffic so awful that you’d rather gnaw off an arm than deal with it. And this’ll be just more of the same.
Maybe not, though. The problem with the Boston 2024 “analysis” is that as far as I can recall, there has rarely if ever been a situation in which capacity on the highways and secondary and downtown roads was severely restricted simultaneously. To the contrary, as just one example (also cited in the Boston 2024 document), when the Callahan Tunnel was shut down recently, other roads (such as the South Boston bypass) were opened in order to ensure that traffic diverted from the Callahan had somewhere else to go. But what Boston 2024 is proposing is basically to give the Olympic Lanes priority access to everything, and the rest of Boston can just lump it.
There’s no explanation in the Boston 2024 document as to how it would be possible to mitigate the impact of the Olympic Lanes. Nor does it seem like the Mayor’s office has given it much thought. From the Herald story:
Boston 2024’s public relations team declined to comment on the shuttle plan, street closures or parking bans outlined in their own proposal, deferring comment to Boston Mayor Martin J. Walsh.
A Walsh spokeswoman said she could not estimate how many on-street and metered parking spaces could be eliminated for the Olympics or which streets may be closed.
“We are still nine years away from the 2024 Summer Games, and it is too early to determine how athletes will be transported or street closings and parking spaces,” said Walsh spokeswoman Laura Oggeri. “Many of those decisions will be driven by the location of the venues, which will be finalized over the coming years after a thorough community process.”
Keep reading those bid documents, folks. There’s lots in there yet to be fully vetted.
dasox1 says
What about business interruption!? I have serious doubts about whether Boston has the capacity to handle an event of this size and complexity. We literally may not be built for it.
jcohn88 says
Boston is the third largest major city in the country after New York and San Francisco, surrounded by Cambridge and Somerville which are even denser.
We’re also a very compact city–one of the smallest in geographical size of the top 25 most populated cities in the country.
Christopher says
Context would suggest so since there are definitely more larger cities than Boston.
jcohn88 says
This is such chutzpah:
“In their bid that won over the USOC, Boston Olympics backers also cited the Big Dig — notoriously beset by colossal cost overruns and delays — as evidence officials are ready to handle the massive roadway and transportation improvements needed before the games….”
chris-rich says
You have a gaggle of local poohbahs and university mandarins cobbling some monumentally half assed mess together that only looks more out to lunch with each new detail.
And when the kitchen gets a bit too hot, it’s time to make a bag holder of the mayor. Classy.
SomervilleTom says
These guys are competing with the casino crew for the scum of year award.
The Olympic proposal is a great big stinking pile of … junk, just like the casino proposals. I’d say “equally absurd” casino proposals, but each is so infinitely absurd that comparison is impossible.
This is only to be expected, given the sleazebags who are promoting each and the interests they represent.
Speaking of those who are promoting this, did I see Doug Rubin’s name mentioned in connection with this Olympic proposal? Really? If so, then a head-slap is needed — Doug, Doug, WHAT are you THINKING? Talk about a career-limiting move.
ryepower12 says
Rubin is on the board of Boston 2024.
Unfortunately, all the politicians are already in line, as well as a huge swath of Boston’s biggest corporations and organizations.
The career-limiting move at this point is opposition to the Olympics — and that’s not going to change until the public comes crashing the gates on this one.
chris-rich says
And the main advantages, beyond intrinsic structural incapacity, are that it is still early and each new revelation of callous ineptitude from all the biggest of wigs here only serves to get more people of the fence and into the opposition column.
Public clamor for macro imposition and a groundswell of popular support for an extended nuisance may never come.
Christopher says
…this basically sounds like an HOV lane. Washington DC does even have routine parking restrictions, lane direction shifts, and an occasional HOV lane even on surface streets. I think as long as these plans are known well in advance and not surprise detours people should be able to prepare.
TheBestDefense says
you can do as a mere citizen to gain access to these restricted lanes, even if you are in a van with ten colleagues or family members and the lane is empty. This is the privatization of public roads for the benefit of a few fairly wealthy visitors for a few weeks.
Christopher says
…but I was making the comparison regarding the effect on others.
TheBestDefense says
but it remains to be seen if the highway dedicated lanes will remove as many vehicles as our current HOVs do. I cannot imagine that would happen.
The privatization of surface roads in downtown areas offers no such justification or benefit. Virtually all local road users, including pedestrians and cyclists, in the Boston Common and Village areas, will be booted out of their regular patterns.
ryepower12 says
Christopher fully volunteering the privization of our public transit system for areas that he doesn’t use? Shocker, I tell you.
Christopher says
I do sometimes have reason to travel in Boston, though even under normal circumstances I much prefer the MBTA to get in and around the city rather than drive.
ryepower12 says
any exception I’ve ever seen, volunteered any number of inconveniences to the people of Boston and those who work in Boston, without ever showing concern for them.
Often in the same breath, you have spoken at at length about how you won’t have to suffer from those problems anyway.
You don’t think about the people who live and work in Boston in any of these posts.
I’m far from the only person who’s called you out on this.
I just think it’s a really crappy reason to support an Olympics because, gee, ‘it sounds swell,’ and ‘I’m not going to have to suffer the consequences anyway,’ because that just about sums up all of your arguments on the matter. That is a fair assessment of them.
Christopher says
My point is that I do from time to time use public transit, which you said I don’t. Plus, remember one of the key reasons I’m excited about the Olympics is that it looks like some things will come to Lowell despite knowing that I could very well be inconvenienced by that (assuming I’m here in 2024). Who knows what I’ll personally be doing or what my personal needs will be in 2024, and for that matter who cares? Regarding people who do live and work where the higher concentration of people will be I say again (and this I HAVE said repeatedly), if other cities who have hosted in the past have figured it out, there is no reason Boston can’t. If I were really being selfish, especially regarding Lowell, I would if anything probably oppose the Games coming here.
ryepower12 says
Sometimes they’ve even been given their own, brand new, private highways built just for them.
I’ve also read that the IOC is demanding priority access to the MBTA — which would mean entire trams just for the IOC and athletes, etc.
I imagine they’ll also want their own MBTA buses.
So, the public is going to be locked out of huge swaths of its roads, rail and very likely buses — in a dense, poorly planned city that struggles to get by even when it has 100% access to them. Boston is a uniquely bad fit for managing Olympic transit needs with our capacity to get around and go to work — and with all due respect the the millionnaires and billionnaires that want first dibs to all aspects of our transportation system, we need it more than they do.
These disruptions won’t be just for the Summer Olympics, either, but also the paralympics and probably for at least a week or two proceeding both events. (Not to mention the months or years of disruption to get the roads in a position to handle whatever systems would be necessary to dilineate and enforce these privatized uses of our public roadways.)
TheBestDefense says
what the meaning of the bid language about boarding the MBTA in the outer regions entails. On face value it seems that Olympic guardians will be telling ticket holders and maybe even members of the taxpaying public where they can park and on what vehicles they can board the MBTA (see p. 65).
Please ryepower12, don’t make claims that the Olympian crowd will want our MBTA buses! There is no way the Swells will settle for our current rolling stock. Count on any new T buses to be redeployed for their use.
Christopher says
You are once again assuming that Boston’s experience will be just “as bad” as any other host city’s despite every attempt by the organizers to acknowledge and address it for the better.
Even if you are right why is Boston somehow “too good” to tolerate what other cities have tolerated? That has been one of my chief objections to the objections. To hear some people tell it a host city is left the worse off and there is now nothing good about London, Beijing, Athens, Sydney, Atlanta, etc.
jconway says
No one is making the argument that Boston is “too good” to handle the Olympics and that we somehow are snottier than other cities that handled it. We are saying first and foremost that with Baker cutting social programs left and right and both parties on the Hill refusing to raise revenue than taking on a few billion dollars worth of public debt is probably a bad idea. And Boston 2024 is naive or dishonest to assume we won’t take on public death (I am leaning on the former since so many aspects of the proposal seem like they were written on a napkin in a bar).
The bid has yet to address anything substantive and has already walked back a significant land seizure proposal, and may need to walk back this traffic proposal. There is also significant public opposition to the proposal which makes this dicier for the IOC to approve.
I am arguing those cities are worse off, I am not arguing they are blighted beyond recognition. No one is. Simply that they spent money they didn’t plan in spending on an event that did not generation billions of dollars of investments or publicity they didn’t need.
For the love of mike-argue against our actual points not ones you make up or straw men you assign.
David says
take the rhetoric down a couple of notches. Phrases like “downright stupid” don’t help advance anyone’s argument.
chris-rich says
So there isn’t all that much reason to sneer. The 2024’s couldn’t have done a better job of undermining their own plan.
It is as if the ‘planners’ were mainly disengaged ditzes and marketing pros who mainly focused on how to sell the thing.
There just isn’t much evidence of planning anywhere as it would commonly be described. The gap between the assumptions and expectations of the IOC and its proxies here and what this neo medieval jammed packed and valuable city can realistically deliver can’t be bridged.
It really is game, set, match and the thing to look to now is how the boosters manage a graceful retreat. It’s already moving from firm to slushy and it’s only a matter of time before it melts.
And there is so much free comedy emanating from it all that opportunities for parody and skewering are legion without much need to be emphatic with the remaining faithful.
jconway says
And to wit, Christopher has been one of the most civil of the Olympic proponents so I will apologize. He certainly isn’t stupid, I am still waiting for a rigorous argument in favor of the bid.
Christopher says
While I stand by the idea that the bidders have made good faith effort to address certain concerns, it would still be nice if someone came here to BMG and really engaged. However, that is not the kind of argument you will get from me. I am more of a cheerleader rather than planner on this one, and yes, this may come from a more emotional rather than rational place.
The irony is I’m not much of a sports fan. I usually only watch the opening and closing ceremonies. If I am still living here in 2024 I’ll probably find a local event to attend just so I can tell the hypothetical grandchildren that I did. For me it is simply the thrill of a lifetime to bear direct witness to an extravaganza which promotes the unity of humanity, where the entire world comes together in friendly engagement producing a glimmer of hope for a peaceful planet. When the Games came to Atlanta, the torch passed through Nashua and a high school classmate of mine who was a track star was one of the runners. To simply be in the presence of such a profound symbol, especially in the hands of a personal acquaintance, was itself awe-inspiring. Imagine how much more so it would be to have the Games themselves so close (even if you can’t get in)!
Anyway, I realize that’s not an evidence-based argument like we’d want for debating public policy, but it is my sincere personal reason for wanting the Games.
kirth says
Now I see the problem. The rest of us are trying to talk about the Olympics as they exist, not the Disney-fantasy version of them.
chris-rich says
We should take up a collection and send him to Rome when the time comes.
Christopher says
I’ve been once, but only for a couple of days, but it’s still not the same thrill as the Games coming to you. I’m sure once will be enough though and it will be one of those things where I think after this I can get a much better seat in front of my TV.
Christopher says
I believe it was George Bernard Shaw who said, and often quoted by RFK, “Some see things as they are and say why; I imagine things as they never were and say why not,” though I do think the Olympics does a good job of channeling such asperations.
kirth says
I’m afraid you’ve misspelled exploiting.
SomervilleTom says
I remember RFK. I was alive and active during his campaign. I remember when he made that speech.
Your use of that quote to defend this Olympic horse manure abuses RFK and the quote.
Christopher says
This is just one of those times that I just have an opinion and that’s all it is. Just one guy putting in his two cents. Maybe two cents is all you think my opinion is worth on this point and that’s fine, but if it does come to a vote the result is going to be sum total of everyone’s opinions. That said, any instance of looking for things to turn out differently is a fine reference for that quote.
jconway says
And frankly, the boosters and other proponents are doing the same thing you are. On a reality based forum, we should expect a greater degree of rigor and analysis. Please follow this rule though, don’t dismiss us as NIMBY naysayers ideologically opposed to the games-or dismiss our rational arguments-when you admit to holding none of your own and are unwilling to do the legwork to formulate them. It’s not just an opinion to is but a case against a seriously flawed policy proposal.
TheBestDefense says
has someone monitoring BMG commentary on their bid but they do not want to engage the community here where they do not control who gets to ask questions and where a dismissive response by them will bring piles of grief. They will choose when and where they engage the public.
And no doubt the USOC will NOT be sending our concerns to the IOC with the final bid.
HR's Kevin says
Not that we should go out of our way to be rude, but I don’t see what is wrong with calling out someone’s argument as “stupid”. It is not remotely the same as calling the person himself stupid, especially when the rest of the comment justifies the criticism.
I think you have used the word “stupid” more than once yourself in the past, so I am not sure what standard you are trying to uphold or why you are choosing to insert yourself here when so very many contentious threads are ignored by the editors.
Christopher says
…but I stand by the idea that such is the vibe I am getting from some people.
kirth says
I believe you have misunderstood people’s reaction to the implication that Boston needs the Olympics to become a “world-class city,” which said people believe it to be already. It’s not that they think Boston is too good for the Olympics, it’s that they think it’s good enough without the Olympics, and that any increase in world-classiness resulting from hosting (which they largely dispute) will be more than offset by the damage resulting from such hosting.
Christopher says
I too think that Boston is a world-class city without the Games. The only thing in that regard that I’ve wondered about is whether having them would light a fire underneath efforts to, for example, improve our transit system which we need to do anyway.
What I seem to be hearing, and again not direct quotes, but the general attitude, are things like:
Let other cities deal with traffic problems, but don’t do that to Boston.
Let other cities tighten their security, but don’t do that to Boston.
Let other cities restrict access to public space, but don’t let Boston.
Let other cities tolerate a lack of transparency, but not Boston.
Let other cities invoke eminent domain, but don’t let Boston.
Let other cities pony up public funds, but don’t let Boston.
Not that there are not legitimate concerns and items which need to be addressed in this list, but there WILL be a 2024 Olympics, just as there have been most leap years for more than a century. Whichever city is chosen for 2024 will have to figure this out, just as every previous host city has. We are not above having to deal with these issues, but precisely BECAUSE Boston is already great I am confident it will do at least as well as any other host, including any other American host, in making this work.
chris-rich says
Boston is clogged and sclerotic. It’s working area is just a horrible fit for that event scale.
You need a lot of contiguous real estate that doesn’t mind being tied up for something frivolous for a significant amount of time. That is the main point of contention and no amount of wishing and hoping is going to change it.
It is really about how Boston has become wildly prosperous and successful as it is with what it has.
And those with long memories can only marvel that it worked out while being very wary of its limits and alert to its limitations.
Bob Neer says
Where is the news here, and how is this a big deal? There are plenty of principled arguments to make against the Olympics, but traffic jams for two weeks are hardly one of them. Those would be well worth it, all things being equal, for billions of dollars of investment and free publicity for Boston. The key issue is if the cities and MA will be on the hook for any cost overruns, not that the event will generate traffic. That is the issue that remains to be adequately explained, in part because it hasn’t been negotiated yet. I’m keeping my open mind.
ryepower12 says
the complete breakdown of people’s ability to get to and from work and go about their daily lives.
We can all live with a little more traffic temporarily – and maybe even for longer periods of time. God knows we’ve been living with awful traffic for years and decades, and it’s only getting worse with the huge growth of the city (both jobs and housing).
But that’s all a separate matter from effectively making people unable to go to work, or residents unable to go about their daily business. Not even during the worst of the Big Dig was there any wholesale version of that.
So let’s stop talking about the Olympics as if it would be a traffic jam. It’s not a traffic jam. It’s a shut down.
TheBestDefense says
You state that there will be billions of dollars of investment but how much in the bid is for permanent improvement in Boston (if you say any, then please show where) and how much would have happened without the Olympics? That phrase “all things being equal” almost never has any meaning. If anyone can identify any new private investment, bring them forward.
If you are suggesting that we should go through hell for more publicity then I am left to wonder why we need to spend so much for promo.
I do agree that the taxpayers being on the hook is important but I put it in first position, since the other two issues, publicity and the possibility of private sector investment, are both speculative and nothing more quantifiable.
long2024 says
When people do that I assume the promises aren’t worth much.
I asked him if he’d support legislation or a ballot initiative holding Boston 2024 to their promise that no public funds would be spent on the Olympics.
He blew me off completely. Refused to answer the question. It was a really simple question. He couldn’t have misinterpreted it. If Boston 2024 is telling the truth, there’s no reason not to support such a law. It would reassure all of us who have doubts that they’re telling the truth, and they wouldn’t give up anything they haven’t already promised to give up.
His waffling implies he’s coming back for the taxpayer money once he’s rammed this through.
jconway says
Billions of losses you mean? That’s a pretty hefty statement to prove, especially since this hasn’t been the case for any other Olympics in recent times. Feel free to link to peer reviewed article showing this will happen, and feel free to show where the bid promises this and how. This bid has been amateur hour the entire way through. We don’t have the resources or the capacity. And the onus is on the boosters to show how their claims hold up, the opposition has provided extensive evidence of past Olympics already.
Bob Neer says
They also often generate massive local government spending, which as I already wrote is a critical issue as yet unresolved. Wikipedia on the last US summer games:
TheBestDefense says
commentary on a pre- 9/11 Olympics to justify an expenditure of billions of dollars on projects that we would never consider except for the games: a stadium that will be dismantled when the games are over, a velodrome that has no demand in our local sports scene, the shredding of the Common for a temporary 14,000 seat volleyball arena, the construction and demolition of facilities on Franklin Park and more. Then there are the two media buildings that Boston 2024 says can be re-sold after the taxpayers pay for them in order to recoup expenses, as they similarly claim they can do for some parts of the Olympic Village. These titans of Boston speak as if they know what our real estate market will look like in 2025. Pure malarkey.
Please don’t point to transportation improvements as being driven by the Olympics as the bidders take pains to say they are not asking for anything other than what the Commonwealth already has planned (even though that is not true).
Any profit that is gained goes to the USOC, not the taxpayers who are on the hook for the construction of of the buildings the USOC wants. And a $10 million ROI of $10 billion would make these folks the worst financial planners in town.
chris-rich says
You can save a hundred dollars on that thousand dollar thing you don’t need or want that much if you buy right now.
This whole foist reminds me of a quote from Culture Against Man by Jules Henry. …Buying things we don’t need with money we don’t have to impress people who don’t care.
SomervilleTom says
If the lanes can be closed in 2024 for this asinine purpose, and the region survive, then it would be far better to close them NOW in order to build permanent new light-rail routes to the north, west, and south of Boston.
Boston is a city in many ways defined by its unique geography. It is a peninsula that has been expanded, through fill, to provide much needed residential and commercial space. There is a reason why the neighborhood is called the “Back Bay“. Boston is already bursting at its seams, every day. I-93 is already a miles-long parking lot north and south of the city every workday morning and evening, with no relief in sight.
We are already miserably failing in our efforts to sustain a society that benefits all or even most of us. Most of us are one paycheck away from poverty. Most of us already can’t get to work when a normal run-of-the-mill snowstorm arrives. Many of us already can’t get to a 9:00a business meeting unless we leave the house at 6:30a. Many of us already can’t get home for even a 7:00p family dinner unless we leave the office at 4:30p.
Your suggestion that it’s no “big deal” to impose even more hardships in order to benefit the convenience of a privileged few upper-crusters who fly in and out from Dubai (or wherever they can spend the least amount in taxes and build the highest and most impenetrable walls against riff-raff like you and me) is arrogant and insulting.
I don’t know if you have children. For a toddler, a two week period when Daddy can’t get home before bedtime is an eternity. For daddy’s employer (if he still has one), a two week period when daddy can’t get to work before 11:00a if at all is an eternity.
For politicians and commentators who allegedly care about the middle class and the least fortunate among us, and who claim to care about “working people”, support for these proposals is just another insulting betrayal.
That is how, in my view, this is a “big deal”.
johntmay says
Shortly after the Olympics I flew to Atlanta and took a buss to Chattanooga. I remarked to the bus driver that the trucks and cars that we passed by on the highway seemed awfully close. He informed me that to help with the added traffic of the Olympics, they added another lane to the highway by re-painting the lines closer together and minimizing the breakdown lanes. If that line of thinking comes to Boston, we’re all in for a ride!
stomv says
not a straphanger who doesn’t have the ability to blow off work for two weeks nor the means to handle child (or parent)-care for the extra hour or two a day transportation will require.
A progressive, forward thinking transportation plan would include beefing up capacity of rail transit now and transitioning Boston into having more bike-bus-taxi lanes as a permanent install by 2024 so that the IOC buses and the public buses would both be more efficient in the Olympics and, once the IOC goes home, the cities would be left with a better transportation system then they have in 2014.
What we’re seeing as a proposal instead is that the transportation system is not improved, and oh by the way, for two weeks anybody who lives, works, or shops in Boston, well, can’t go much of anywhere.
Bob Neer says
I don’t live in New York. I’d say a more relevant point of view might be “Spoken like a guy who lives in Atlanta” but, sadly, we don’t have any of those to the best of my knowledge. As a practical matter, the chance that Boston will adopt a “progressive, forward thinking transportation plan” with DeLeo as Speaker and Baker as Governor is, I would say, very low absent an impetus like the Olympics.
TheBestDefense says
important in our transportation planning unless a two-thirds majority in both chambers decide they want to raise taxes to pay for our existing un-met transportation needs. Both chambers and the Gov have made it clear that is not going to happen for a long time.
God save us if DeLeo does get involved in transportation planning. The last time a Speaker tried that was Finneran in 2000 who gave us the “forward funding” plan that crippled the T by shifting $3 billion in Commonwealth debt onto the T budget in exchange for giving the T 20% of the state sales tax.
The lege typically authorizes bonds that far exceed the capacity of the Commonwealth to issue, by a factor of ten. That effectively turns over to the governor the decision about which ones are issued and which sit on the shelf, which projects go forward and which don’t. The five year capital spending plan let’s us know which ones are likely coming so I expect the existing plan will be significantly altered to reflect Baker’s interests.
The Olympics will not motivate a “progressive, forward thinking transportation plan.” It is however likely to do is drag down planned expenditures in other parts of the state to feed the beast of the Olympics.
chris-rich says
That is what strikes me as magical thinking. It sees the situation mechanically as if the counterweight of a ponderous event will somehow break a log jam that has other reasons for existing.
But all recent data provided by those here digging into past Olympiads has not supported the assumption. And it is hilariously similar to specious arguments advanced that conversion of an old mill building to an Art Museum would somehow leverage the North Adams economy.
Have you been out to North Adams? I have and it’s your basic moribund mill town with a big white elephant that makes very nominal contributions to the area economy. I visited it in the winter of 2010.
It is very similar to the ‘rain follows the plow’ argument used to sell the eastern Montana desert.
As a lifelong arts advocate, I wanted that argument to be true, but as an honest realist, I have to admit that it turned out to be a crock.
petr says
This a blanket declarative that is not true. Data has been submitted that both supports and denies that assumption.
Among the data presented are the following: Barcelona appears to have attempted exactly this leverage, and succeeded. Atlanta has a contested record. Sydney tried, and clearly failed. Athens failed, but for entirely separate reasons. I don’t know enough about Beijing to even begin to speculate, except that it’s the only one of the past six not to be held in a democracy. London, post Olympics, has two straight years of record breaking tourism. Whether or no you believe the Olympics caused the dramatic increase in tourism, certainly the preparation for the Olympics has left them in a sweet spot for exactly that uptick in tourism (one could also make this contention about Barcelona)
Two unqualified successes, two clear failures, one mixed bag and one complete unknown among the last six Summer Olympiads is a record that would indicate a cautious optimism is not misplaced.
HR's Kevin says
You have presented absolutely no evidence that the increase in tourism in London is a direct result of the Olympics and not other factors, such as an improving economy. But even if it were so, why should most of us care? What percent of us will benefit?
It’s not like hotels are sitting around empty during the summer. What problem are you trying to solve? Tourism is already booming. How much more is it going to grow? And how much more do we want it to grow?
And as I have said many times before, if all we wanted was increased tourism, we could get it much more cheaply by focused spending on that.
TheBestDefense says
about tourism growth in London over the past two years, so I checked on the study by MaterCard on which the article on tourism growth was based. It said that the Olympics had nothing to do with the growth in tourism. If you look at other articles on the subject you will see Mayor BoJo attributing the tourism spike to many cultural activities and never mentioning the Olympics: “Our city perfectly combines history, heritage, arts and culture, not to mention vast amounts of green space and major events that are the envy of the planet.”
Special events like Wimbledon and according to London & Partners : Some of the major cultural events in London this year drawing millions of international visitors include ‘Ming: 50 Years that changed China’ at the British Museum, ‘Constable: The Making of a Master’ at the V&A and ‘Rembrandt: The Final Years’ at the National Gallery.
Among many other 2014 events expected to capture worldwide attention is the commemoration of the 100th Anniversary of World War I with the re-opening of the Imperial War Museum this month and the ‘Great War in Portraits’ exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery. Together with an exhibition about fictional detective Sherlock Holmes at the Museum of London and the Thames River Festival in September, this year offers a feast of activities for visitors.
chris-rich says
Those are all the London promotion themes I see in my Google Plus home stream where I engage people daily who actually live in the UK.
The main buzz is around a number of bold buildings with quaint names like the Shard, the Gherkin and the Eye, a huge ferris wheel.
And then, of course, it is London, center of planetary finance and former seat of a very large empire.
I just introduced an innkeeper in the northern UK to a Dabke dance clip from Syria while wondering if the people in the video are still alive.
All in all I haven’t noticed much Olympics touting among the Brits in the crew. Maybe they are glad it’s over?
HR's Kevin says
What exactly is “free” about it?
And with all due respect as someone who lives in Boston and commutes through downtown Boston every day, I totally disagree that two (or more) weeks of traffic jams is not a big deal. However, I also agree that other issues are probably even bigger deals than this: the cost in money and misaligned public resources and in development projects that may not be the best for Boston are probably even bigger deals because they will have a longer lasting impact.
chris-rich says
There’s a wonderful child like faith in the blessings of hype and the imaginary mountains it moves.
While it could be noted that this hype drive oddly fails when the economy tanks, it is nonetheless a thing to be valued by its adherents who wax ecstatic from a ‘good write up’ in the way a toddler sees a decorated conifer bedecked with presents.
And there is a whole area in fuzzy economics that actually tries to assign a monetary value to these rosy intangibles in the hope that it will put bean counters to flight.
Bob Neer says
$180 billion in annual US advertising spending suggests many see value in certain kinds of publicity.
HR's Kevin says
Yes, advertising helps sell products. What product are we selling in this case? How great Boston is as a place to live so that more people move here and contribute to the rise in housing and transportation costs? Or is it just Boston as a tourist destination? But couldn’t we simply increase our tourism marketing and advertising budget and save us several billion dollars? And while it is generally good to have tourism as part of our economy, how big a part should it be? After all, tourism is cyclical and depends a lot on the state of the economy and exchange rates. Surely we don’t want it to be too big of the economy, right?
I should also point out that the vast majority of advertising spending is done in a way that can be measured and associated with the benefit it provides in terms of sales. That is simply not going to apply in this case. There is a huge difference between buying a slot one day in prime time and hosting the Olympics.
chris-rich says
It’s like secular magic. There’s an industry adage attributed to some old ad exec. “I know half of my ad budget is a waste of money, I just can’t figure out which half”.
And marketing is a slightly different animal with even more mysterious assumptions irregularly borne out. When the economy tanks, does advertising arrest the plunge?
It functions as an amplifier like the frosting on the economy cake.
And the newer data driven forms are particularly interesting. Granularity was all the rage a while ago and was touted as a Facebook advantage as it had the potential to find all the 20 to 30 year old women in metro Denver who own pugs and use Head and Shoulders.
Efficacy may have been exaggerated and it is interesting to see Google move rapidly away from being primarily and ad supported company to being a device maker.
They have pretty much bailed on serving small ad word ads to desk top platforms and the cookie driven nag-vertising doesn’t seem to be doing numbers either.
And another form of wishful spending, church donations, are just under half of that at 98 billion in 2011. It would be interesting to see which has more efficacy.
petr says
…I have lived and worked in Massachusetts, and from various locations have commuted either by car or by subway or by commuter rail to points in an around Boston that entire time.
It has been my experience that, by whatever metric you choose and concerning whatever method of commute, a drop in all traffic exhibits itself, starting in June of every year and lasting well into September: between the absence of Massachusetts large population of transient students and vacationing workers being elsewhere, getting into, around and out of the City of Boston during those months is comparatively much much smoother. To what extent Boston differs from other cities in this regard, I cannot say. The only impediment has been repairs to roads and/or transit systems which can be planned (and sometimes the need for repairs).
My question, therefore, is this: How bad is the overall traffic going to be in July and August of 2024? Will the addition of Olympic traffic simply bring us to parity with “normal” traffic patterns seen the other 9 months of the year? Will it be greater than that? And, if greater, how much greater? Sure, the event will generate traffic, but it will do so, under this scenario, during a period where other traffic is absent.
paulsimmons says
What will happen is the equivalent of connecting a garden hose to a fire hydrant, for these reasons, among others:
1.) Dedicated lanes will reduce access for cars, trucks, and busses.
2.) Necessary security provisions will create traffic chokepoints on both secondary highways and residential streets.
And these are just preliminary objections; we’ll forget the fact that there is no real traffic modeling being done to date. There was some rhetoric at the Suffolk meeting from Fish about a Captain-Billy-Gee-Whiz-All-Purpose-Model coming down the pike (no pun intended), and some infantile extrapolation from existing traffic patterns, but nothing that fits any empirical assessment.
Your “scenario” has at best a tenuous connection with reality.
petr says
I’m not sure you can say this and then later note “no real traffic modeling being done to date”. The evidence I have presented is decidedly empirical.
But the dedicated lanes will be for the Olympic fleet, which is presumably A) athletes back and forth between their events and the planned Olympic Village as well as 2) for shuttle busses for spectators,volunteers and staff who, according the bid documents:
“Spectators and volunteers/staff traveling by car will be intercepted remotely and redirected to park- and-ride facilities strategically located throughout the region . Shuttle buses will then provide access from these remote parking facilities and transit/rail stations to venues .”
Are you making the contention that absent dedicated lanes for these persons traffic will be easier? I don’t see how that could be the case… I know you don’t want the Olympics to begin with, and that’s fine, but if we are going to consider the Olympics serious proposals for mitigation should be put forward.
Possibly. But the segregation of traffic into dedicated purpose lanes might mitigate this and relieve the burden of security near venues. I’m not sure this is a valid objection.
paulsimmons says
…not empirical.
petr says
… that the possibility of 50 people traveling in a shuttle bus not competing with all other traffic (dedicated lane) is somehow MORE disruptive to traffic patterns than the possibility of each of those 50 persons competing directly with all other traffic in their own respective automobiles?
I understand your aspirations are for no Olympics whatsoever. But, for the nonce, we have to contend with the possibility. So answer the simple question: if Olympics, why not dedicated lanes?
TheBestDefense says
have no time limits on them in the bid so we should assume they are 24-7. There is no reason to believe they will remove more traffic from our roads than a small number of vehicles so the Pike, Rte 93 and Rte 95 get squeezed for the benefit of the few. The loss of the Boston ByPass and the roads around the Common, the Village and other facilities will completely shut those areas down to vehicle traffic, bikes and peds.
SomervilleTom says
Screw them. As far as I’m concerned, we should direct the IOC and anyone else who cares to the MBTA website so that they plan their Olympics-related trips. When the time comes, they can use Google Maps with the “traffic” overlay (or whatever its equivalent will be in 2024) just like the rest of us.
My posture is: Boston is what it is. If the IOC likes it, more power to them. If not, goodbye and good luck.
bob-gardner says
Boston is great already. Maybe in some inferior place like Barcelona you have to build a velodrome, but we have a world class convention center, let them ride bicycles inside that. Sure the corners may be a little tight but those bicyclists should be glad to be racing in Boston, with 8 million people within 50 miles.
I’m sick of people on this thread pretending that they like this city and then running it down. If you think Boston needs to set aside dedicated lanes and build new stadiums to be good enough for the Olympics take your negativity somewhere else, preferably more than 50 miles away.
petr says
… as the ultimate disposition of any lanes will fall to the discretion of the municipalities in which they reside or, in the case of highways, the CommonWealths Department of Transportation. I do not see how that leads to a de facto 24/7 dedicated lane for Olympics traffic when the Olympics themselves will not, obviously, be 24/7. Athletes, too, need to sleep. Indeed, some of the roads you cite already have flex time use of breakdown lanes for rush hour. How would this be any different?
Also, while the venues will be fixed, the times of them are not. The opening and closing ceremonies have traditionally been on weekends and the events themselves don’t have to be timed to co-incide with rush hour traffic.
TheBestDefense says
that are proposed for dedicated use outside of Boston surface roads are controlled by the MHD. If Richard Davey, the CEO of Boston 2024 and the former Secretary of Transportation uses his connections from his previous job (hence my previous warning about violating the “forever clause” in the conflict of interest law that you rejected) then the bidders will likely get their exclusive lanes.
If Boston 2024 wants to demonstrate that it is not over-reaching, then it is up to them to spell out that they are not making a 24-7 claim. We should assume they are until they prove otherwise. At the moment they simply write that they want to be in control.
SomervilleTom says
My preference is for the fifty very special people to disrupt some other city — a city foolish enough to want the entire circus.
If, somehow, the Olympics do come here, I think those fifty people (along with all the other poobahs) can get in line just like the rest of us.
TheBestDefense says
who are using the vans and mass transit. The point one percenters will be paying mega-money to stay in the downtown five star hotels. They will be catered to like royalty with luxe transportation on the city streets that are dedicated. The next tier of Swells will stay at the four star hotels in the city. The next tier will stay a little further from the core and it is they who will be shuttled on the highway dedicated lanes, along with local volunteers and local residents who attend the non-paid events (the torch parade for example).
petr says
… but be that as it may, it might yet happen. If the City of Boston, however foolishly, decides to act against your preference (shock! horror! gasp!) a knee jerk antipathy to all things Olympics makes the difficult into the unwieldy.
Are we assuming all fifty will be ‘poobahs’?? Do I detect a whiff of class resentment? I do not think such resentment is justified. As noted, the lanes will primarily be for athletes/coaches, volunteers, staff and spectators. Entirely possible there will be nary a ‘poobah’ amongst them…
Athletes, some of whom won’t speak the local tongue, and their coaches, will not be ‘poobahs’.
Volunteers, who will make up the bulk of the event staff and who will not be paid, will surely not be ‘poobahs’. London 2012 made use of 70,000 of them.
Staff… Isn’t the very term ‘staff’ sorta the opposite of ‘poobah’??
Spectators… maybe a ‘poobah’ here or there, but I really don’t think so. I expect that there will be a number of limousines in the city at that time. I don’t know the extent to which they will be allowed the use of the lanes. It’s a good question.
SomervilleTom says
I don’t care who they are, they can get in line.
HR's Kevin says
What empirical evidence are you referring to?
chris-rich says
If you took all the words “petr” has feverishly scribbled to tail wag 2024 and laid them end to end, they still wouldn’t reach a convincing conclusion for the need and value of a 10 pound crap spectacle in a cramped 5 pound bag city.
As a pettifogging exercise, it is at least effervescent.
With any luck the word count payment plan is at least getting the train fare from Leominster covered.
petr says
.. It’s all pro-bono. I guess your theory of cynicism-as-motivator needs a few tweaks to it.
Who’s paying you?
chris-rich says
They are sending me huge checks.
The really funny part of all this avid scribbling you emit is the failure to grasp that text is no longer as useful as it was before we could augment communication with hyper links, video and still images.
A common reaction to a fat mass of text in a box from a source not noted to be a gripping read is to just ignore it. And it is wonderfully easy.
This venue admittedly has a significant number of older people who still value text as a primary pathway to learning, but even they are not willing to wade through these post swamps that have been skillfully described by others with more patience than I.
That is the real takeaway from your ‘ouvre’, a strange incapacity to envision how others are likely to handle the eyeglaze of another fat scribble.
It tells us that the capacity to do a word count avalanche is more important than actually coming to know and appreciate the basic preferences of readers at this time, ie ..less is more.
petr says
… to the bid document in questions, page 11 (page 17 of the PDF) and specifically to the chart entitled “Supplemental Chart: Boston-Logan Scheduled Service. 2013 Weekly Frequencies to Select Destinations“.
It is a chart, demonstrating a real, measurable, increase in frequency to all listed destinations, of flights out of Boston: the increase in question occurs during the months of June July and August and represents approximately a 30% increase over the lowest frequency travel months of January, February and December.
More flights OUT of Boston mean less people, overall, IN the CommonWealth. I think you should revisit your use of the word ‘tenuous’.
HR's Kevin says
And I can definitely tell you that roads or lanes getting blocked off in the summer does lead to traffic jams. There are also most definitely major issues whenever there is a Red Sox game.
Perhaps the highways aren’t as bad in the summer, but the city streets have plenty of rush hour traffic issues year round.
TheBestDefense says
lanes on Rte 93 and 95 on the Friday eve/Sat AM and Sunday eve/Monday morning commute for Cape Cod visitors, there will be a real mess.
chris-rich says
Summer brings an influx of tourists visiting or passing through on the way to the vacation spot states to the north. Winter shrinks available road space.
It is a densely populated jammed and crammed area with lots of mope and hope driving that quickly becomes stall and crawl.*
*Thanks ever due to Kevin O’Keefe.
TheBestDefense says
on the other side of the canal I think. Do you know if the Cape Cod Chamber of Commerce has examined what will be the impact on vacationers of removing lanes to/from the Cape for a few weekends during peak tourism season?
seamusromney says
eom