Hamburg’s bid to host the 2024 Olympics collapsed on Sunday after the majority of the city’s residents voted against the multi-billion euro multi-sports event.
According to Ciaran Fahey of the Associated Press, some of the reasons for citizen opposition seemed to include “the refugee crisis; the Paris attacks; a football friendly involving Germany canceled due to a terror scare; scandals at the German football federation and FIFA; and the recent Russian doping scandal.”
Will you offer us a hand? Every gift, regardless of size, fuels our future.
Your critical contribution enables us to maintain our independence from shareholders or wealthy owners, allowing us to keep up reporting without bias. It means we can continue to make Jewish Business News available to everyone.
You can support us for as little as $1 via PayPal at [email protected].
Thank you.
According to a report from the BBC, 51.7 percent of Hamburg and Kiel residents “voted no in a referendum” to have a chance at hosting the Olympics in nine years.
BBC also reports that the plan would have cost approximately €11.2 billion, with city authorities having only promised to cover “a small fraction” of the expenditure.
The situation reshuffles the cards in the race to land the world’s biggest games with Paris, Los Angeles, Budapest and Rome left.
The International Olympic Committee will decide between those potential venues in September 2017.
This is the second time in two years that the German public has turned down the chance to host an Olympics after residents refused Munich’s bid to host the 2022 Winter Games in a 2013 referendum.
“That’s a decision that we didn’t want, but it’s clear, ” Hamburg mayor Olaf Scholz said in the BBC report.
David Wharton of the Los Angeles Times, reports that Hamburg bid leader Nikolas Hill said the results were “bitter”.
