MUNICH, Germany (Reuters) – Germany is considering bidding for the Olympic Games, a top official suggested, building on the success of an international event in Munich featuring nine sports and using many of the venues built for the 1972 summer Olympics.
The Bavarian capital is hosting the European Championships from Aug 11 to Aug 21, with large crowds flocking to, among other sites, the Olympic stadium, the Rudi-Sedlmayer hall and the Olympic regatta centre, to see sports including Olympic maintstays athletics, cycling, gymnastics and rowing.
“I think you can organise Olympic Games without everything being on a massive scale,” German Olympic Committee (DOSB) president Thomas Weikert told ARD television. “Here is a very good event with nine sports and you can see that you can build on that.”
Summer Games up to and including 2032 have been allocated to host cities.
With the International Olympic Committee (IOC) desperate to reduce the cost for host cities, which has scared away many potential bidders, having a proven 50-year legacy is a major bonus should Germany decide to bid for the 2036 edition.
The DOSB has repeatedly failed to bring the Olympics – summer or winter – back to Germany since 1972.
“We are thinking about Olympic Games in Germany – winter or summer. We are thinking about it but will first ask the members. We will issue a timeframe at the next general (DOSB) assembly in December,” Weikert said.
The winter Olympics have been allocated up to 2026, when Milan and Cortina D’Ampezzo in Italy will host, with Japan’s Sapporo the favourite for 2030.
Weikert said the DOSB will not propose a specific city but draw up a plan that will need to be followed in order for one candidate to eventually emerge from this domestic process.
“We will not make the mistake of saying it will be A or B. We will ask extensively and see what comes out, if indeed Germany wants the Olympics,” he said.
“…I am convinced the members will view this positively and will follow us in the proposals that we will make.”
Past Olympic bids or plans for Hamburg, Leipzig, Berlin, Munich or the Rhein-Ruhr region among others came up against strong opposition, with local referendums in some cases ending the projects early.
The main reasons for opposing the Olympics in Germany have been costs, the environmental impact, limited perceived benefits for local residents and the IOC’s refusal to pay any taxes in the host country for the billions of dollars of revenues generated by the event.
Paris will host the 2024 summer Olympics while Los Angeles will stage the 2028 edition and Brisbane in Australia the 2032 Games.
(Reporting by Karolos Grohmann; editing by John Stonestreet)
