Vancouver Bid for 2030 Winter Olympics on Hold Until Spring

3rd November 2020

Last modified on May 13th, 2021

A decision on whether the Canadian city should bid to hold the Games 20 years after it last did so has been delayed until next March. UPDATED

A debate was due to be held in April, shortly after the 10th anniversary of the 2010 Games, but was delayed due to the coronavirus pandemic.

The postponed discussion was scheduled to take place on Wednesday 4th November just as another potential host, Pyrenees-Barcelona in Spain, decided to put its bid on hold.

It’s now been agreed to defer again until March 2021.

Sapporo in Japan and Salt Lake City in the USA have also expressed an interest in hosting a future Winter Olympics.

Vancouver City Councillor Melissa De Genova is calling on people to back the bid, saying a Winter Olympics will help the city bounce back.

“As a city councillor, I see it as my duty and responsibility to leave no stone unturned, and consider all opportunities to bring benefits to our city, and catalyse the prosperity of our residents,” she told the online news website for Vancouver, Daily Hive Urbanized.

“More now than ever, I think we need to look at every single opportunity we have to support our economy. I would hope that my fellow city councillors and the mayor will look at this from the angle of offering new economic opportunities.

“This could be a missed opportunity if we don’t move forward with this.”

Councillor de Genova later asked for another delay to give officials a chance to produce a report on the merits of holding the Games, to hear the public’s view and to allow for Covid-19 recovery.

*BREAKING*Pre-pandemic I asked City Council to consider 2030 #Vancouver #Olympics motion.
Tonight, I asked Council for referral to staff for report back in March 2021.
WHY❓👇
✅Public can speak to Council
✅Informed decision making
✅ #COVID19 recovery opportunities#VanPoli pic.twitter.com/QTSvO28GSq
— Melissa De Genova 鄭慧蘭 (@MelissaDeGenova) November 5, 2020

Vancouver held the Winter Olympics in 2010, with snowsports taking place at Whistler.

Much of the same infrastructure could be used.

The former Chief Executive of Vancouver 2010, John Furlong, said the Games could be the most sustainable in history.

“The question is can we use 2030 to help inspire behaviour from everybody to come together and lift the city out of this, and leave some really positive legacies,” he said.

“If ever we needed a spiritual lift, an emotional lift, or a hopeful lift, it’s now.

“If we were to go into this and achieve this, we’d have more time to do it — we’d have a longer window in which to really take advantage of the power of something like this to get people excited, get our confidence back, and rehabilitate our morale.”

Meanwhile, the Catalan authorities have said the proposed Pyrenees-Barcelona bid for 2030 has been put on hold due to a lack of support from the Spanish Government.

Inside The Games reports that the International Olympic Committee’s former vice president, Juan Antonio Samaranch, said the bid should go ahead only if there is full backing.

“It is essential that for the Pyrenees-Barcelona candidacy to go ahead there must be a total quorum among public administrations,” he told the Spanish newspaper Mundo Deportivo.

“If there is no reliable, solid, powerful, powerful, public agreement from the central government, Aragon, Generalitat, City Council, Provincial Council, better not go.

“This is everyone’s project, or nobody’s; a project of the youth, of society, that they reach an agreement, as in Barcelona 1992.

“If not, it is not worth continuing.”

Should a Barcelona bid be successful, the city would become only the second to host both a Summer and Winter Olympic Games.

Beijing in China, which is scheduled to hold the 2022 Winter Olympics, held the Summer Olympics in 2008.