Budapest clears next hurdle in bid to host 2024 Olympics

Budapest, December 8 (MTI) – The International Olympic Committee (IOC) has approved the second round of documentation for Budapest’s bid to host the 2024 Olympic Games, Balázs Fürjes, the government commissioner for the bid, told MTI.

The IOC, whose executive board is winding up a three-day meeting in Lausanne on Thursday, declared Budapest “a perfectly suitable city” that is “an equal competitor with Paris and Los Angeles”, Fürjes said.

The IOC also cleared the submissions of second-round documentation by Paris and Los Angeles.

Budapest will submit the third round of documentation next February, Fürjes said.

“With steady and sustainable financial growth, Budapest is in the right position at the right time to deliver a low-risk and more affordable Games for the Olympic Movement. And, with the fastest-growing tourism rate in Europe, we are the right city to create an electrifying atmosphere for athletes in full and vibrant venues,” Fürjes said in a release on the official website for the bid.

“Budapest can become a template for the IOC to show how the Olympic Games can be staged in mid-sized cities around the world, providing a new generation of more affordable and lower-risk host city locations, where the Olympic Games can be staged in culturally, architecturally and environmentally beautiful and exciting settings in cities on the rise as alternatives to mega-cities and large capitals,” he added.

The IOC will decide on the venue of the 2024 Olympic Games in September 2017.

Budapest’s stage two candidature file shows the total construction cost of venues to be used if it wins the right to host the 2024 Olympic Games would come to 2.76 billion US dollars.

Hosting the 2024 Olympic Games would generate 3.7 billion euros in revenue for Hungary and contribute 0.3 percentage point to GDP growth, Péter Szijjártó, the foreign minister, said earlier.

Photo: Brick Visual

Source: MTI