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Hungarian Olympians Laszlo Vajda, Attila Mizser and Agnes Kovacs, along with Budapest 2024 bid Chair Balazs Furjes
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Budapest 2024 rejects an underdog label, but the Hungarian capital stands out from its competitors for the 2024 Olympics and current host Rio in a key way: It’s much smaller.
The Budapest bid committee wasn’t subtle about that point during a press conference in Rio today, hoping to make its “mid-sized” status an asset amid a Games known for its traffic and long distances between venues.
“The question, a theoretical question, is bigger necessarily better?” said bid Chair Balazs Furjes. “What we can propose is a compact, intimate arrangement, in a mid-sized global city with exceptionally short travel distances … and the whole city turning into one single Olympic Park. I think it makes sense.”
Budapest has roughly 1.7 million residents, making it about the same size as Philadelphia. It’d be by far the smallest Summer Olympic host since Athens in 2004 after Beijing, London, Rio and then Tokyo take turns. Competitors for 2024 hosting rights are L.A. (3.9 million), Rome (2.6 million) and Paris (2.4 million). But those cities have much larger surrounding suburban developments, especially Paris and L.A.
The question of size is an interesting one, because Olympic budgetary watchdogs like Andrew Zimbalist say small cities face a far more serious “worst-case scenario,” because the Games’ sheer size can overwhelm infrastructure and budgets. But conversely, athletes, support staff and sports business people have struggled mightily to get through the crowded highways of Rio (population 6.3 million).
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| Budapest 2024 bid Chair Balazs Furjes speaks to reporters during the Rio press conference. |
Furjes said Budapest can handle large events well, and pointed to the city’s annual Sziget Festival in August and its experience hosting Formula One races and next summer’s FINA World Championships as proof. He also said the bid has hired PricewaterhouseCoopers to conduct a feasibility study.
Furjes claimed all venues would be within six kilometers of Budapest’s city center, but the bid document does call for preliminary rounds in football and volleyball, as well as golf and some other sports, to be played in other Hungarian cities.
The bid team also promised easy transportation via the Danube River, calling it our “own Olympic blue lane,” referring to the practice of reserving lanes on host city highways for official Games business. Many of the venues could be reached via ferry, the bid says.
