Third Brisbane stadium in a new-generation Olympic bid
The feasibility study into a 2032 Olympic bid based around Brisbane has arrived at a low bottom line of $900 million
Brisbane could get a brand new boutique stadium and an upgraded swimming centre as part of a new generation-style 2032 Olympic bid unveiled today.
And the feasibility study into a possible southeast Queensland bid has arrived at a startlingly low cost of $900 million, $300 million less than the cost of staging the Gold Coast Commonwealth Games last year.
Many of the savings will come from taking advantage of existing venues such as Brisbane’s Anna Meares velodrome and the $40 million Coomera Indoor Sports Centre. But the two pre-eminent Olympic sports from an Australian perspective — swimming and track and field — will have new facilities built. That especially is the case in terms of the athletics venue, which traditionally doubles as the venue for opening and closing ceremonies.
Though details remain closely guarded, the main stadium would be a boutique 30,000-seat venue — something akin to Melbourne’s AAMI Park — that could be temporarily boosted to 60,000-seat capacity and, through clever design, also be made to incorporate an athletics track.
Although Suncorp Stadium or the Gabba could be jerry-rigged, organisers are working on the belief that Brisbane needs a separate, smaller, boutique-style stadium.
Gone are the days of Olympic cities spending so much they go bankrupt, with the International Olympic Committee’s groundbreaking Agenda 2020 report actually targeting cost-neutral Games. In other words, the intention is for the income generated to match the costs, though that has not quite happened with the southeast Queensland bid.
Brisbane’s operational budget was calculated at $5.3 billion, which would then be offset by IOC contributions of $1.7 billion from television rights and sponsorship, while domestic revenue would be expected to account for a further $2.7 billion, leaving a net operating cost of $900 million.
This was broken down to $400 million for the Olympics, which have been temporarily scheduled for August 13-29, 2032, and $500 million for the Paralympics, from October 5-17 that year.
It seems illogical that an Olympic Games could be run more cheaply than a Commonwealth Games but then the Gold Coast received no contribution from the international Commonwealth Games Federation, while ticket sales generated one-sixth of what a Brisbane Olympics could expect.
Brisbane Lord Mayor Graham Quirk, the chairman of the Council of Mayors, admitted he was initially taken aback by the budget projection.
“It was surprisingly low but having said that I have interrogated those numbers as well and we believe it is not only a low number but also a conservative number,” Quirk told The Australian.
Might then the ultimate figure be lower? “There is every potential for that to occur but rather than be brash and bold we have been conservative in what we have presented and I think that is the right way to go,” Quirk said.
The feasibility study showed that 60 per cent of the venues needed for the Olympics already exist across eight of the 10 councils involved.
A further 30 per cent have been planned or have been identified as a future community needs, irrespective of whether the region hosts the Games. And 10 per cent of venues will be temporary.
While a significant stadium might be required on the Sunshine Coast, at, say Mooloolaba or Caloundra, for the beach volleyball, there would be no need for a permanent structure.
There have been no infrastructure costs factored into the Games budget because such things as roads and public transport systems will need to be built whether or not southeast Queensland wins the Games.
“About three weeks ago, the Council of Mayors brought down a People Mass Movement Study which showed what infrastructure we need to keep pace with population growth through to 2041 and, along that pipeline, where we needed to be by 2031,” said Quirk. “If we can do that and keep up with that population growth, then that is all that we need essentially to be able to proceed with a bid with confidence. We’re not building infrastructure for the Games; we’re building infrastructure for the needs of southeast Queensland.”
John Coates, the president of the Australian Olympic Committee, which ultimately will be the body that will determine whether Australia lodges a bid to stage its third Olympics, insisted the bid was predicated on the region making provisions for the necessary infrastructure before the IOC votes in 2025. But he said the IOC would be well pleased with the Brisbane report — and he should know, given he is head of the IOC’s inspection team for next year’s Tokyo Olympics.
“The way it has been presented would please the IOC and the detail would please the IOC. It’s very thorough,” Coates said.
Given that the study was conducted by former AOC secretary-general Craig McLatchey and his company, Lagardere Sports, that is hardly surprising.
McLatchey has been a behind-the-scenes adviser on several Olympic and Commonwealth Games bids.
Far from suggesting that the Brisbane bid wasn’t grandiose enough, Coates insisted the IOC would actually approve of it.
“The IOC wants cities to use existing venues and the IOC is expecting that the Games will pay for themselves. This is exactly what the IOC is trying to achieve,” Coates said.
He said the next step was for the Queensland and federal governments to examine the numbers. So too the AOC.
“Queensland have to do more investigation themselves around financial impact and feasibility. So they are not there yet,’’ Coates said.
“There have been good preliminary talks with the current federal government in regard to infrastructure in southeast Queensland and I gather there have been discussions with Bill Shorten’s side of government as well.”
Both Quirk and Coates agreed that a decision on whether a bid would be submitted needed to be made by next year, with Coates cautioning that it should not be delayed beyond the first quarter.
“I’d be taking it first quarter so that you can have a presence in Tokyo, one to promote the bid and two to learn,” Coates said.
Quirk said initial surveys showed that 56 per cent of resident in southeast Queensland approved of an Olympic bid, with that figure rising to 65 per cent among millennials. It would appear Brisbane has some ground to make up given that the unofficial Olympic website, A round the Rings, has a picture of what it claims is Brisbane. In fact, it’s a picture of the Gold Coast, though since that is one of the 10 councils that would be involved, it is not too serious a faux pas.
The two Koreas are discussing an Olympic bid for 2032, while India and Indonesia have expressed interest. Shanghai is mulling over whether it is too soon for China to bid again following the Beijing Games of 2008, while Germany has taken Brisbane’s idea of a regional games and expanded it to an entire nation, outlining a plan for a Games spread over 13 cities.
Coates admitted he was open-minded about where the opening and closing ceremonies might be staged in Brisbane, perhaps echoing IOC president Thomas Bach’s recent suggestion that the 2024 Olympic city, Paris, should perhaps consider staging them in the city centre itself.
It’s a radical idea, one fraught with security concerns, but it was done at the recent Youth Olympics in Buenos Aires.
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