OLYMPICS-WINTER/CHINA Scarce snow and three locations will not hinder bid says Beijing

Record ID: 146113

  • Title: OLYMPICS-WINTER/CHINA Scarce snow and three locations will not hinder bid says Beijing
  • Date: 27th July 2015
  • Summary: KUALA LUMPUR, MALAYSIA (JULY 27, 2015) (REUTERS) ***WARNING CONTAINS FLASH PHOTOGRAPHY*** CHINA WINTER OLYMPIC 2022 BID COMMITTEE SITTING IN NEWS CONFERENCE SIGNBOARD WITH SLOGAN READING (English): "JOYFUL RENDEZVOUS UPON PURE ICE AND SNOW" REPORTERS (SOUNDBITE) (Mandarin) WANG HUI, SPOKESPERSON OF BEIJING WINTER OLYMPIC BID COMMITTEE, SAYING: (INCLUDES INTERPRETER TRANSLA
  • Embargoed: 11th August 2015 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Malaysia
  • Country: Malaysia
  • Topics: General
  • Reuters ID: LVA7AVAYV4THLV278CGBC728CV0A
  • Aspect Ratio: 16:9
  • Story Text: Beijing's bid committee says scarcity of natural snow and hosting events at three different locations is not a weakness in the city's bid to host the 2022 winter Olympic Games.
    Speaking in Kuala Lumpur on Monday (July 27), where the International Olympic Committee votes on Friday (July 31), bid committee spokesperson Wang Hui said Beijing's organisational ability would be the most important factor in running a winter Olympics.
    "You can't have a successful winter Olympic just by having deep snow," she told reporters at a news briefing. "Because the winter Olympics needs the ability to receive the guests, to organize the games, support by the people working on ticketing, volunteers, and security. Beijing has showed it can do it through the 2008 Olympic."
    Beijing or the Kazakh city of Almaty will win the right to host the 2022 winter Olympics in Friday's vote. Four other candidate cities: Krakow, Poland; Lviv, Ukraine; Stockholm, Sweden, and in 2014 Oslo, Norway dropped out of the process.
    If Beijing wins the Games it would be the first city to host both the summer and winter Olympics, having held the 2008 summer Olympics in the city.
    Lim Chee Wah, chairman of one of the proposed venues, Genting Ski Resort, said other resorts had a shortfall of snow at that time of year (February and March) too. He said Beijing had the resources to be able to produce sufficient artificial snow to allow the Games to take place successfully.
    "You know also worldwide even in the Alps and in Switzerland they don't have snow too at the same time. So what we're blessed with is sufficient water reserve and also the snow making capability," he said.
    Beijing has already announced that it would use a number of 2008 Olympic Games venues for the indoor events of the winter Games, such as figure-skating, curling and ice hockey. The iconic National Stadium, nicknamed the Bird's Nest stadium, would host opening and closing ceremonies.
    But the sliding and skiing events would to be staged in two mountain sites 74 and 180 kilometers away respectively at Yanqing and Zhangjiakou.
    Wang Hui said the decision to host in those locations was not a weakness. She said it was important to build centres for skiing and sliding where they would be used after the Games was over.
    "The question is, is this a disadvantage or advantage to have three different venues? Many people think this is the weakness of Beijing, which is wrong, because we need to consider about the sustainability of the venues," she said. "We don't think having all venues in one location will bring benefit after the games."
    Both Almaty and Beijing have said they have updated their plans to take advantage of the IOC's Agenda 2020 initiative which was adopted in December last year. The Agenda is designed to help candidate cities make their bids more sustainable and efficient, using existing venues and keeping costs as low as possible.
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