Time to Sprint for Athens
January 10, 2003
Why do the two Athens Olympic mascots have such big feet? Because they have to run so much! No one knows yet whether the pun, which is a running joke in Greece at present, will become an embarrassing reality in August 2004. But what is clear, is that Athens is far from ready for the 2004 Olympics, and will have some scurrying around to do yet, in order to get things finished in time.
Airport without a connection
Greece is extremely late with its preparations for the Athens Olympics in 2004: Train connections from the airport to the city center -- or even to the Olympic competition sites -- still haven't been built yet. And even if the tracks are laid in time, it is almost certain that only provisional, non-electrically run trains will ply the route - the appropriate railcars were ordered too late.
The Athenians took so much time building and rebuilding the competition sites that in 2000, former International Olympic Committee (IOC) president Juan Antonio Samaranch threatened to retract permission to put on the Games if the city didn't hurry up. Sydney started looking forward to getting the Olympics for the second time in a row.
According to the city's government, the main problem lies in the financing. Since taking office on January 1, 2003 Athen's new mayor, Dora Bakojanni, determined that the city was financially immobilized. She insisted that the central government provide Athens with more funds or else the Olympics would not take place in the city.
Finished and functional
The IOC is now keeping its eye on the Greeks: A coordination commission from Olympic headquarters in Lausanne, Switzerland, advises the Greek colleagues and not just internally.
In addition the pressure from the IOC, including to retract the games caused the Greek government to appoint a new head of the national organizing committee (ATHOC). The new head, Gianna Angelopoulos-Daskalaki (47), has since employed various new people and has made an attempt to turn things upside down.
Too bureaucratic
IOC chairman Denis Oswald publicly bemoans the Greek bureaucracy and urges haste. At worst the decorative aspects of the new buildings erected for the event should be dispensed with, Oswald insists, such as a roof designed by the Catalonian architect Santiago Calatrava to span numerous Olympic sites (model, below right). According to the chairman, the essentials need to be finished and functional, there is no time left for aesthetics.
Under the leadership of Angelopoulos-Daskalaki the relationship between the IOC and Athens seems to be improving.
In Lausanne the IOC is “impressed” by the achievements of ATHOC. There’s “not a day to loose” though, Emanuelle Moreau of the IOC in Lausanne told DW-WORLD. If the projects still lacking aren’t tackled immediately and with full power, they won’t be ready by August 2004, said Moreau.
Hockey on the runway
However, the Olympic site Helleniko illustrates how tense things still are: On the premises of Athens’ old airport, the Olympic basketball, canoe and hockey tournaments are supposed to take place in 18 months. The IOC exhorted the Greeks to begin construction in 2001 unless they planned to show the world hockey from the runway with a backdrop of derelict airplanes. By early January 2003 nothing visible had yet taken place on the tarmac.