Pressure is mounting on Italian authorities to accelerate preparations for the Milano Cortina Olympics amid funding gaps and unusually warm temperatures, even as the head of world skiing openly advocates a fundamental overhaul of how future\u00a0Winter Games\u00a0are hosted.
\nWith the Games due to start in February, International Ski and Snowboard Federation (FIS) president Johan Eliasch said Italy\u2019s challenges were symptomatic of deeper structural issues facing winter sport, as rising costs, climate pressure and under-used infrastructure fuel calls for a rotating model of permanent Olympic hosts.
\nGrowing concern over climate pressure, escalating costs and the waste of Olympic infrastructure after the Games is strengthening support within international sport for a rotation system, under which a small pool of established venues would host the Winter Olympics on a recurring basis.
\nProponents argue that such a model would allow long-term planning, reduce spending and ensure consistent conditions for athletes and spectators, rather than forcing hosts to build or upgrade facilities that are rarely used once the Games end.
\nEliasch said several Olympic venues were facing technical difficulties not because of shortcomings by local organisers, but because of funding issues at government level.
\nGames organisers have said the venues will be ready on time.
\n\u201cWe see here that there are some venues that have technical difficulties. It\u2019s not the organizing committees. It\u2019s just simply a lack of funding from the Italian government,\u201d he told Reuters in an interview.
\n\u201cIt\u2019s really important that every effort is now made to make sure that everything is ready on time.\u201d
\nEliasch warned that readiness alone was not enough.
\n\u201cWe know that we will get everything somehow ready on time,\u201d he said. \u201cBut the question is, of course, what? And that what needs to meet a certain quality threshold and also experience threshold for the spectators, the fans, the athletes, first and foremost, to make this a success.\u201d
\nHe warned that funding constraints could push preparations beyond critical tipping points.
\nSNOWMAKING CONCERNS
\n\u201cWe shouldn\u2019t be penny wise and pound foolish,\u201d Eliasch said. \u201cAnd there are certain tipping points here in the process beyond which there is no return.
\n\u201cSo from a quality perspective, for what we\u2019re trying to do here, it\u2019s really important that funding doesn\u2019t become an impediment to deliver the best of the best for those two and a half weeks in February,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Pressure is mounting on Italian authorities to accelerate preparations for the Milano Cortina Olympics amid funding gaps and unusually warm temperatures, even as the head of world skiing openly advocates a fundamental overhaul of how future\u00a0Winter Games\u00a0are hosted. With the Games due to start in February, International Ski and Snowboard Federation (FIS) president Johan Eliasch …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":253,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-251","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sport"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakistantimesusa.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/251","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakistantimesusa.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakistantimesusa.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistantimesusa.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistantimesusa.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=251"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/pakistantimesusa.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/251\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":255,"href":"https:\/\/pakistantimesusa.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/251\/revisions\/255"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistantimesusa.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/253"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakistantimesusa.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=251"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistantimesusa.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=251"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistantimesusa.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=251"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}