World Baseball Softball Confederation President Riccardo Fraccari "stopped short of issuing a verdict" after inspecting Fukushima Prefecture’s suitability as a potential host for the 2020 Tokyo Olympic baseball and softball competitions, according to KYODO. He scouted Azuma Stadium in the city of Fukushima and Koriyama’s Kaiseizan Stadium, but "insisted the purpose of his visit this time was to gather intelligence rather than reach any kind of conclusion." Fraccari: "At the moment, I’m just collecting information of the stadiums. The problem for Fukushima is not just the stadium. We have to check about the transportation, the facility for the teams and the schedule." Fraccari "did not mention a deadline for the competition format and overall schedule" but noted that the stakeholders would have to work fast. The organizing committee wants to finalize the details at the IOC’s exec board meeting from Dec. 6-8 (KYODO, 11/20). THE MAINICHI reported canceling construction of the Sea Forest Waterway in Tokyo Bay as the Olympic canoe and boat course would cost some 10B yen ($90M), it was disclosed at a meeting on Friday of the Tokyo Metropolitan Assembly's Olympic and Paralympic Games committee. Construction of the venue for the Tokyo 2020 Games began in July this year, and the metropolitan government's project head told the committee that some 3.8B yen ($30M) had "already been earmarked to disassemble and move a waste facility on the site," and another 900M yen ($8.11M) had been committed to test designs. Cancelling the project now "would incur costs related to restoring the site to its pre-construction state" as well as compensation for the contractors, with the total loss expected to total some 10B yen. Regarding other 2020 Olympic and Paralympic venues, the metropolitan government investigative team has stated that it believes renovating the Yokohama Arena to host the volleyball competition would cost more than the 700M yen ($6.31M) currently estimated (THE MAINICHI, 11/19).
