Los Angeles is out of the race.
The U.S. Olympic Committee chose Chicago on Saturday to represent the country’s bid to host the 2016 Summer Olympics. Los Angeles, which has hosted the games twice in the past, was Chicago’s final competitor for the bid.
Had Los Angeles received the bid and eventually been chosen as the host city, UCLA would have been home to the Olympic Village and the games’ volleyball tournaments.
Excitement had been expressed by both students and faculty, some waking up as early as 3 a.m. on Friday to attend a live taping on campus of the “Today Show” special on the Olympic bid.
The decision concluded a year-long search for an American candidate.
Chicago will go on to lobby and compete to host the Olympics until the International Olympic Committee makes the final decision in October 2009. Other cities that expressed interest in hosting the 2016 games include Madrid, Rome, Prague, Rio de Janeiro and Tokyo.
The choice of Chicago was a big disappointment for members of the Southern California Committee for the Olympic Games, as well as Los Angeles residents who wanted to bring the games to their city.
An anxious crowd gathered at the Grove in Los Angeles, at an SSCOG-sponsored event, to await the decision of the Olympic committee. A disappointed wave of sighs filled the area when Peter Ueberroth, head of USOC, announced from Washington, D.C., that Chicago had won the bid.
“In the past two years the community support, the political support, the business support, has been extraordinary ““ it’s a pretty serious letdown,” said Andy Knox, vice president of SSCOG.
Part of the reason Los Angeles was not picked was because the city has hosted the games twice, whereas Chicago would be a completely new venue, said John Naber, secretary of SSCOG and a former Olympian.
Michael O’Hara, a UCLA alumnus and a U.S. Olympian in volleyball now on the SSCOG committee, said the international committee likes to see a change in the location of the games.
The two cities had fundamentally different approaches for their bids.
The Los Angeles bid highlighted the city’s existing facilities and the small amount of athletic facility construction and renovation that would be needed to prepare for the games.
Chicago’s bid used a more centralized approach, detailing plans to build new facilities catering to the games. For example, Chicago will have to build a $1.1 billion Olympic village, which they plan to do by the lake front.
“There’s some mystery about doing this for the first time,” Knox said.
In selecting a city to represent the U.S., it was USOC’s job to find the city it believed would best represent and win the bid for the United States.
“They obviously thought it would be an easier sell to bring the Olympics in 2016 to Chicago rather than Los Angeles,” Naber said.
Members of SSCOG said one of the city’s goals in hosting the Olympics was so young people in Los Angeles would be able to witness the games live, and potentially be motivated by them.
When Los Angeles hosted the Olympics in the past, it helped contribute to changes in the dynamics of the Olympics, O’Hara said.
In 1932, Los Angeles introduced the concept of the Olympic Village, where all the athletes stay together. SSCOG had chosen the UCLA dorms to be part of the Olympic Village in 2016, if Los Angeles had been chosen.
In 1984, Los Angeles reversed the pattern of the Olympics being financially disastrous for the host city by using existing facilities and implementing a larger scale of volunteers.
Despite their disappointment, SSCOG members expressed their regards for Chicago. Naber spoke on behalf of Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa in wishing the Windy City the best in the international bid.
“We want them to do well. All of us wish Chicago nothing but great success,” Naber said.
Though Los Angeles did not win this time, the ultimate objective is to have the 2016 Olympics in the United States, Knox said.
With reports from Bruin wire services.