| The campaign to bring the 2024 Summer Olympics to Boston – which divided the region for six months while stirring up wide-reaching discussions about urban planning strategies and the future of Boston on the world stage – is officially over.
U.S. Olympic Committee and Boston2024 officials said they would not pursue the $4.6-billion plan including construction of a temporary stadium in South Boston and events held from Lowell to New Bedford.
“Notwithstanding the promise of the original vision for the bid, and the soundness of the plan developed under (Boston2024 Chairman) Steve Pagliuca, we have not been able to get a majority of the citizens of Boston to support hosting the 2024 Olympic and Paralympic Games, “ the groups said in a joint statement. “Therefore, the USOC does not think that the level of support enjoyed by Boston’s bid would allow it to prevail over great bids from Paris, Rome, Hamburg, Budapest or Toronto. “
The announcement came hours after a last-minute press conference at which Boston Mayor Martin Walsh distanced himself from the cause he had championed, reiterating his opposition to signing a public bid document exposing taxpayers to potential cost overruns.
“This is a commitment I cannot make without assurances that Boston and its residents will be protected, “ Walsh said Monday morning. “We are unable to conclude our analysis without knowing the full scope of risk contained within the 2024 games. “
Los Angeles is widely viewed as the USOC’s back-up choice, with a final selection of U.S. host city expected in September.
The pitched public debate reached a boiling point in the past week: while Walsh was visiting the Vatican, City Councilor Tito Jackson sought to subpoena the original unredacted bid document from the Boston 2024 organizing group. The organization released the document Friday afternoon; critics said the documents overstated public support in Massachusetts.
Backers and opponents clashed during a prime-time debate Thursday. Gov. Charlie Baker said Friday he wouldn’t take a stand on the issue until the results of an outside study are completed by The Brattle Group, a Cambridge-based consulting firm. Baker’s comments came in response to reports that the USOC had asked Baker for a commitment as soon as today.
Since the USOC chose Boston as its top choice in January, the privately-organized effort to bring the 2024 games to Boston struggled to gain public support. Although organizers said they could privately finance the games, and would take out insurance policies to inoculate the city’s taxpayers from exposure, residents remained skeptical. Many feared a repeat of cost overruns and years of disruption from the Central Artery Tunnel project, and doubted whether the region’s transportation system could handle 166,000 daily spectators given its recent crippling by winter weather.
Critics also denounced the bid as a potential sweetheart deal for developers, particularly in the estimated $1.2-billion redevelopment of the Widett Circle neighborhood where the temporary Olympic stadium was proposed. The bid documents proposed giving the master developer a property tax discount starting at 85 percent that would decline over a 40-year period. Existing tenants of the industrial area, such as the New Boston Food Market, said the Olympic organizers failed to communicate with them or make plans to relocate them before submitting the original bid.
“There’s a potential there regardless of what happens with the Olympics. We could develop Widett Circle into hundreds of millions of dollars in tax revenue and build out another part of our city, “ Walsh said Monday.
After polls showed wider support for the Olympics statewide than in the city of Boston, Boston 2024 relocated event sites across the state, from whitewater rafting on the Deerfield River to sailing events in New Bedford. In contrast, the original plan had concentrated events in the city to create the “most walkable“ Olympics in recent history.
