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Tokyo Government Panel To Review Costs For Three 2020 Olympic Venues

A Senior Tokyo government official said that a panel tasked by the Tokyo metropolitan government with reviewing the costs for hosting the 2020 Tokyo Olympics and Paralympics "plans to propose that the construction of three venues should be reconsidered, and existing facilities possibly used," according to KYODO. The plan is part of an "overhaul that the panel will recommend in its initial report on facilities to be built by the metropolitan government." The panel was set up earlier this month by Tokyo Governor Yuriko Koike, who is "keen to reduce the mounting costs of the Games." Details of the proposed changes "will be made public on Thursday at a meeting of a task force for metropolitan government reform." The official said that the three Olympic venues "proposed for scrutiny" are for volleyball, swimming and rowing and canoe sprint. The panel believes alternate locations "should be able to host these sports." At the time of the Olympic bid, Tokyo's original estimate for construction of new facilities was 153.8B yen ($1.5B). But the budget was "later projected to expand nearly threefold" to 458.4B yen ($4.5B), "partly due to rising construction costs" (KYODO, 9/28). REUTERS' Gallagher & Lies reported the proposed changes, which would require the approval of the IOC and each sport's int'l federation, "are the latest in a series of setbacks and broken promises for organizers who had won the bidding largely on Japan's reputation for efficiency." Public broadcaster NHK said that the panel would propose moving the venue for rowing and canoeing to Tome City in the northeastern prefecture of Miyagi, "due to soaring costs and because not enough measures had been taken against wind and waves at the site in the original plan." A Tokyo Metropolitan Government official declined to comment, saying "while they were aware of the media reports they had yet to receive an official report from the panel" (REUTERS, 9/27). The AP's Jim Armstrong reported already, venues for basketball, taekwondo and cycling have been "moved outside of Tokyo to maximize existing facilities." Cycling was moved to Izo, some 145km southwest of the capital. Tokyo Organizing Committee President Yoshiro Mori said that the original figures "were the result of sloppy calculations" which he "blamed on the Tokyo metropolitan government and the Japanese Olympic Committee" (AP, 9/28).

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