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2012 Olympic Evaluation Team Lauds City's Bid Improvements
By Amy Shipley
Washington Post Staff Writer
July 16, 2002—SAN FRANCISCO, July 15 -- The U.S. Olympic Committee site evaluation team looked a combination of satisfied, exhausted and mind-boggled as it concluded its evaluation of San Francisco's bid for the 2012 Summer Games this afternoon. Expressing satisfaction with the changes San Francisco has made to its bid since last year, the USOC officials said they believed the bid could win internationally.
"This is a fine, and it may even be an exceptional, bid," USOC site evaluation team chair Charles H. Moore said. "I congratulate your bid city team. You understand what it takes to win and you've carried it forward."
The officials were exhausted for obvious reasons: A six-hour flight delay Monday had intensified the workload in the last 28 hours as they concluded their visits to the four cities -- Washington-Baltimore, New York and Houston are the others -- seeking the U.S. nomination for the international contest for the Summer Games.
Beginning with a 7 a.m. breakfast today, USOC officials heard San Francisco's plan for an athlete-driven, environmentally conscious, flexible bid that featured a fair dose of the city's natural beauty.
By the end of the whirlwind trip, the predominant vibe the notoriously secretive site team officials exuded was a sense of the complex nature of the task ahead. By September, the evaluation team plans to reduce the field to two cities, and in November, the USOC board of directors will choose the U.S. candidate for the International Olympic Committee's 2005 selection.
Having now seen the plans of all four cities, USOC site team members seemed struck and daunted by the realization that they are dealing not with four similar bids that will invite quick and easy comparisons, but rather with four cities that have taken drastically different approaches to winning the Olympic Games.
The USOC officials spent today's question-and-answer session grilling bid officials about the transportation concerns that arguably represent San Francisco's biggest challenge to staging the Games. They seemed simultaneously impressed with San Francisco's plan and approach, and vividly aware that it contrasted sharply both with the plans and approaches of the other cities, as well as with their own earlier comments about what they considered desirable.
San Francisco bid officials "made significant changes in their venues, which we think are really impressive," Moore said. "Plus, they've made improvements and given us greater assurances in transportation. They are off and running in a number of key transportation elements."
However, despite San Francisco's progress on $10.5 billion in transport upgrades that are pegged for completion by 2012, and despite the bid leaders' attempts to concentrate venues by eliminating a venue cluster in far-away Sacramento, USOC officials admitted the bid still contains an element of sprawl that the other plans do not. The bid calls for bid clusters in San Francisco, Palo Alto, Oakland and San Jose.
USOC officials did not criticize the sprawl, though they have treated the concept with repugnance in most other settings. When USOC site evaluation team vice chairman Deedee Corradini lauded the Washington-Baltimore bid leaders for condensing five competition clusters into two, she added the more compact a bid, the better.
Today, however, she said she had been persuaded to see another approach. In the Olympic-themed, culture and entertainment packed clusters proposed by San Francisco, fans could attend a couple of events in one day and enjoy the other elements of the competition clusters, journeying another day to another cluster.
"There's no question compact venues are an advantage to the Olympic Games," Corradini said. But "we don't see this as being too dispersed. You've got enough sports in one cluster. . . . The most you can go to in one day is two events."
San Francisco officials say they would transport fans, athletes and officials quickly using existing rail lines, proposed extensions and dedicated highway lanes. They point out that all but two venues are within walking distance of public transportation.
Moore gave high marks to San Francisco's plan for an Olympic Village even though the bid team hasn't yet purchased the land for which the complex is planned. Bid leaders convinced the USOC that, should they win the bid, they could easily acquire the land because of their intention of using it after the Games for affordable housing, which is desperately needed in this area. Moore also did something uncustomary: He publicly compared San Francisco with the other bidding cities -- with respect to weather, which has been a favorite topic of bid leaders, who have been touting San Francisco's cool, rain-free summers.
"I don't think there is any question a temperate climate is a plus," Moore said. "We think San Francisco is unchallenged in terms of a great climate."
Bid leaders have also emphasized San Francisco's other undisputed strength: Its international appeal, which they attempted to showcase today by ferrying USOC officials around Alcatraz and Treasure Island.
"We think we can win internationally," San Francisco bid president Anne Cribbs said. "We have the best bid for athletes, and we think we can be the best partner going forward."
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