142 million for taxpayers? What a bargain! If Lake Placid goes for another Winter Olympics in 2026, one could easily see taxpayers paying at least 500 million, with a realistic 1 billion spent. This would be matched with revenue funding of course, from broadcast rights, tickets, merchandise and sponsorships of say 1.5 billion.
The narrator mentions that foreign athletes will be living in a federal prison, during the games. After traveling, training and studying there, I found out many interesting things that were never public information. From the locals, I got a great reality of the games. This is a small community up in the mountains, that were expected to make this work, for the world stage. Some people had to think of the future, after the games, and what would happen to the city after everyone left. Someone planned to build a facility that would house the foreign athletes, temporarily, then they would make the place a prison after the games were over. this was an economic decision that led to many protests from foreign athletes. They did not want to stay in a prison. The building was built with a central circle with a few long legs leading outward, like a spider. This design was very suitable for both a prison and a housing facility. Having stayed there, it was not any different than a hotel room, but maybe a little smaller. We stayed there and slept two per room with separate beds. I would say it was quite suitable, and most of the fuss was of a political or economic issue. In the end, other countries bought real estate, in Lake Placid, to house their athletes, temporarily. However, when I was there it was believed that many of those houses are still owned by other countries in order to send athletes to train at Lake Placid. The housing facility that would become a prison never became a prison, and it serves the purpose of housing trainees, for Olympians, Coaches, etc... It has very healthy foods, trainers, therapists, and the best of the best athletes and support. The facility is set up in a manner where You could live there, and some athletes do. The foreign athletes would have suffered in no way by staying at the facility that never became a prison. Today, it is an honor and a unique opportunity to stay in that would be-prison. That is because of what happened, in 1980. In the prior Lake Placid Olympics, many of the events were held on the high school facilities. One example is the speed skating track. They flooded the high school running track. Lake placid is one of the few cities to host Olympics, twice. They are, also, one of the few who survived the onslaught of everything coming to town, and leaving. Today, it seems next to impossible that they could handle todays format, and host another.
