There are five cities in the USA that bidding for the Olympics
in eight years: Houston, Philadelphia, LA, San Francisco & Chicago.

I heard that the first cut will be Houston & Philadelphia.
Chicago has a very good chance at at least being considered.
I think LA has had two too many times and San Fransico...well
I don't know about their situation.
We'll know by the end of the year.

Having the Olympics in a midwestern City would be fantastic.
With all the tradeshows that used to bring people to the
windy city have moved to Vegas as everything seems to have
to move to Vegas.

Some of the plans would have the Opening & Closing ceremonies
in two arena's. A temporary one for track & field and Soldier
Field. Appearantly when SF was rebuilt they didn't think about
the Olympics. At one time there was a T&F. It didn't help they
got their Historical Registry Pulled. The Rowing Competition would
also be in Racine, WI where they had the US trial 2 years ago.

The village would be in the heart of where all the activities are
which is a plus and there wouldn't be much to build for the games
since there's so much already available locally. With two
ball clubs, hockey, football, soccer, etc etc.

Also Millenium Park being the most visited & recognizable tourist
attraction, people would really flock to the city more than ever.

With the Gay Games ending on Saturday. It shows how the city
can pull together in less than two years. With both private and
public funding from business and people. The volunteers and
the area suburbs who brought the games together turly shows
why Chicago can be a great place for the Olympics. Plus the
earnings were somewhere around 50 million or so.

Someone on the Café told me they went to the Figure Skating
event a few days ago. How wonderful it was. He wrote:

"the final spotlight piece was a production number, done by skaters from all around the world, put together in less than two days and it was incredible!

The theme was "Intolerance" and, during the piece, the skaters took off their jackets to show T-shirts, each with a deprecatory word for someone who is gay on it and, at the end, they circled up and produced, in a VERY magical way, a rainbow streamer that encircled the entire group of skaters.

The crowd stood up and cheered, even the bigoted guy two rows in front of us.

THAT was a magical moment. "

If you can bring a magical moment like that and more to Chicago,
there will be many more when the IOC brings the Olympics in 8 years.

I'm hoping at least.

The bigoted guy bought himself a ticket and spent an afternoon at the Gay Games?

I haven't spent much time in Chicago, but I'd like it more for a Winter Olympics than a Summer, from my little experience. I was at the North American Bridge Championships in the Summer of '98, which were in Chicago, and it was brutally hot and uncomfortable, and that was just getting from the playing site to my hotel, or a restaurant, or doing some sight-seeing. God forbid doing any running or any other physically exerting event, or sitting around for a few hours watching. Got any mountains or anything?

It was brutally hot all week during the gay games too.

It can get brutally cold in Chicago too and that can
be with no snow...plus the only ski hills in Chicago
area are in WI (as far as I know) 5 mins north of me.
They need mountains for skiing. So I can see why
no Winter Games. But UP Michigan would be a
fantastic alternative.

They need a Spring Olympics.

There's no such season as Spring nor Fall for that matter.
It seems that the seasons have merged that its either:
Hot Humid Rainy or Cold Snowy Dry.

The American Contract Bridge League seems to deliberately book brutal weather conditions to get off-season rates or something. I've also been to a Summer Nationals in San Antonio (made Chicago look temperate), a "Spring" (mid-March) Nationals in Vancouver and Philadelphia (snow/rain/etc.)...you get the idea.

I wouldn't put it past the IOC or NBC (whomever decides to sponsor telecast it)
to make a 4 seasons game. After all, more money right?

I understand where you are coming front.
This past week with the Gay Games it was absolutely hot.
In fact, it affected some of the sports I understand.
Except of Figure Skating...

Its too bad they don't telecast those games. I would
have loved to watched Ballroom Dancing, Western Dancing
and of course Billards.

The reason San Francisco can't get any olympics, including the gay olympics, is because the city is ran by a pack of loons who can't pull it together long enough to fill a pot hole let alone arrange a bid for a sporting event. They couldn't even get a bicycle race organized. I'll tell you this, the big idea SF came out with to get the olympics was to build a mall in the 'hood'. In the olympic bid they had events along a 700 mile range from LA to Nor Cal. That being said the Bay Area would be a far superior location for the olympics than Chicago. First our weather is nicer. We have four six sport stadiums in the area, seven if you count the old football stadium in Golden Gate Park (Giants Stadium, Candlestick, Oakland Stadium, Cal, Stanford, SJ State), a number of enclosed sports arenas, large sporting fields, the bay for sailing, country for bike racing, all that good stuff. We have plenty of sights for tourist to see other than sporting events as well. Sure our gays don't seem as obsessed with the the events the way the Chicago types are but we have the numbers.
Steve V <--member of the Keep The Olympics Out Of Mid America Committee

The first gay olympics were held in San Fransico.

Yes! We do everything first cuz our gays thought of it, now we can't get the dang thing back and lets face it, other than Province Town the rest of y'all shouldn't have the gay olympics, you all can have....um...a corn festival! Yes, The Great Chicago Corn Festival, that'll work for me.
Steve V

At least we have the bean.

What is the Bean?
Steve V

Okay Marshall, my psychic friend, you predicted the top three would be: Houston, Philly, and Chitown a maybe....the top three are....drum roll....San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Chitown a maybe! Tada!
Steve V

http://www.millenniumpark.org/artandarch......ate.html

I never mentioned who'd I said would be in the top three.
It's been on many news programs in the past week that
the three to make the cut would be SF, LA & CHI.

I wrote about why Chicago should get the bid over
SF & LA.

Since I dig you I'll vote for Chicago!
Steve V

So I was thinking that if and when
Chicago were to become a US Olympic
finalist. That flooding the Events
office with ideas of grandeur for
a huge opening ceremony with magic.

why? because the historical connection
to the city is just to great not
to have it.

something like the superbowl that
dan produced but grandeur. you could
almost have actors portraying
dante and blackstone...and more.

Hmmmm.

I like it! Here in San Francisco we were going to have all the male athletes in drag and the ladies ride into the stadium on choppers.
Steve V

I am rooting for Chicago, then I could go the Olympics and watch! Or wait, 8 years... maybe.. maybe.. nah.. yah!!! Olympics Chicago!

Christian

I'm thinking up some ideas now.

Maybe theme it with some fake
asian magicians and some real ones...

Chris & I can plan 'If I had my way'
like last night.

oooo.hmmm.
:)