A great chance that shouldn't be wasted

The World Cup has shown the way for us to make a success of the Olympic Games - and we shouldn't shirk from paying the extra #1.5bn forecast for regenerating East London

Published in the Evening Standard 6 July 2006

Today is the other anniversary. Like tomorrow's, it marks a year since a rare moment of solidarity in the life of this city, a time when Londoners came together and realised the depth of their attachment to this place, and perhaps even to each other. Unlike tomorrow's, this anniversary is one we will remember with a smile.

It was a year ago today that we heard the hesitant voice of IOC president Jacques Rogge announce that the Olympic Games for 2012 would go to the city of - followed by an agonisingly long pause as he fiddled with the envelope - "Lonndon!" He sounded as shocked as we were.

Few of those had given London much chance of winning. Used to sporting defeat, we assumed Paris was the obvious victor. But for the rest of that day, into the evening, there was a quiet, nodding satisfaction. We watched the pictures from Singapore - of Ken hugging Becks, both in their British-bid beige suits - and caught the excitement: a world event was coming to our city.

It lasted until rush hour the next morning. On July 7 London made the world's front pages for a different reason, and the Olympic celebrations felt like they belonged to another age. Yet the work has gone on and this week is the right moment to see how it's going - just as what's claimed to be the biggest, most successful sporting event in history draws to a close. Those organising London 2012 should be taking a good, hard look at Germany 06. For the World Cup has been a masterclass in how such things should be done.

Not one of the fears pessimists had about the tournament has materialised. There were warnings (including from the Vatican) that Germany would turn into a giant brothel, with one US Congressman predicting that 40,000 women would be trafficked into the country to be exploited as sex workers. It hasn't happened. Indeed, German prostitutes have complained that business has been down: the men have been too busy watching football.

There was minimal hooligan trouble; the Poles, who the German authorities had their eye on, exited meekly at the group stage. There has not, to date, been a terrorist attack, fear of which so haunted the tournament organisers. Nor did Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad turn up to watch his national side, thereby tempting arrest as a Holocaust denier. Nothing has gone wrong.

Of course, Seb Coe and his team cannot do anything to replicate the Germans' good luck. But there are some lessons, positive and negative, they can learn. The first is transport. Those who were there have lauded the simple efficiency of the Germans' ability to get people from one place to another. On the largest scale, it was the completion of the new Hauptbahnhof train station in Berlin, a gleaming steel-and-glass marvel that was meant to open two weeks before the World Cup - and did, on time and on budget. More modestly, it was the lines of trams that awaited the crowds as they spilled out of Leipzig stadium, ready to ferry supporters to the train station. No queuing, no pushing, no shoving. How did the Germans pull this off? "It's not complicated," says the Guardian's Berlin correspondent Luke Harding. "The Germans threw money at the problem."

When it comes to transport, that’s been their habit for decades, long
before the World Cup, but they kept it up. The federal government spent some e3.7 billion (£2.7 billion) on infra-structure, whether building new roads or kitting out new train stations. They also chipped in e200 million (£146 million) for the upgrading of the 1936 Olympic stadium in Berlin and another e50 million (£36.5 million) for the Leipzig arena. And that doesn’t include the hefty sums spent not by the central government, but by Germany’s different regional authorities, the länder, both on modernising their own stadia and on policing and security.

It all adds up to serious money. Coe and co should take careful note, especially as reports today suggest a £1.5 billion rise to £5 billion as the costs of regenerating East London are factored in. The Germany 2006 experience is proof that major events like this do not come cheap — the hosts spent billions even though a World Cup is much less costly than an Olympics, because a football tournament can use existing football grounds. The 2012 Games can draw on some venues that already exist — tennis at Wimbledon, basketball and gymnastics at the Millennium Dome and, improbably, beach volleyball at Horse Guards Parade — but it will also have to build at least nine from scratch. So it is no wonder the estimate of infrastructure costs stands at £2.375 billion. It may be time to do as the Germans do — admit this will cost a lot and set the budget accordingly — rather than endure six years of rows over spending overruns and bloated budgets.

There are more humble lessons, too. One of Germany 06's triumphs has been the big screen, outdoor TVs lining line the so-called "fan mile." The enabled even those without tickets to enjoy the occasion: one million Germans did that for Tuesday's semi-final against Italy. It was a reversal of the old FIFA slogan: "If you don't have a ticket, don't come," and it ensured the tournament became a genuine public festival. We should insist the London Games go the same way.

One World Cup experience to avoid: ticketing policy. Yes, there should be affordable tickets, like those for the group games that went for #20 each, but there should be no repeat of this summer's great corporate sell-off. Incredibly, 16% of the tickets for England's games were handed over to sponsors and their well-heeled clients; just 8% went to the FA to be sold onto England fans.

Above all, though, we should do what we can to emulate the host nation's spirit these last two weeks: welcoming, outward-looking and seizing on the chance to lay some national cliches to rest. Germany has made the most of its opportunity. London has six years to do the same.

Posted on July 6, 2006 05:25 PM

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