Boston 2024

Ruairi said:
I disagree with this. I moved to the area 7 years ago, having lived all over the world. Boston is an after thought when it comes to American cities. The main reason for this IMO is the way local government is set up. Most people around the world have heard of Harvard, very few could tell you where it is, Same for MIT. There's no joined up thinking, no promotion of greater Boston. If you say Harvard is in Boston you get corrected.

Most people see Boston as a hardworking blue collar city with very little reason to visit. If you are going to visit the East coast of America, you are going to visit NYC or DC, not cities like Boston or Philadelphia, sure you've heard that there is some historical stuff in these cities but is it really worth it.

Nobody has heard of the Charles River or the Isabella Stewart Gardiner Museum or the BSO, First night, the 4th celebrations on the esplanade, the public gardens, the beautiful old architecture in the back bay and Beacon Hill. All anyone knows is that theres a common and a cheers bar and they saw the Departed and that math movie with Robin Williams oh and their good at baseball but I've no idea how that's played.

I think Boston, with it's history, culture and sport is one of the worlds best kept secrets. There is nowhere near the amount of tourists and foreign investment there should be considering the calibre of the city (greater Boston, not Boston).

The Olympics would be a great way for greater Boston to present it's self as one of the greatest cities in the world. If you don't think it is, try living in a few of the others.

edit: (except for winter, I still haven't got used to that! :) )
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Ruari -- I'm not sure what backwaters you lived in:

Let's investigate several categories of visitors to our provincial burg many of whom come here at sometime to go to college, work, sell / buy or participate in a conference /trade show or meeting:
  • High Technology crowd -- they are much more familiar with Boston / Cambridge than NYC or Philadelphia let alone Chicago or Atlanta
  • The same is true with anyone involved in the Physical Sciences, Medicine and education at all levels
  • past couple of decades Boston / Cambridge has been the nexus of Biotech and increasingly Traditional Pharmaceuticals
  • Financials -- Boston is on par with all but NYC / London in terms of money management
  • brewing Beer -- well represented in that
  • the American Revolution -- goes without saying
  • Victorian Architecture in the Back Bay and South End
  • Music -- many schools and of course the BSO and Pops
  • Art -- the MFA
  • MOS -- globally recognized
  • BPL one of the worlds great collections
  • Pro Sports
  • the Marathon
  • Head of the Charles

Your friends and acquaintances seemingly are involved in mining salt or processing Yak Butter?

PS: Faneuil Hall / Quincy Market with about 20 M visitors annually is a Top 20 global tourist site
 
Boston does quite well, in global rankings of all kinds. Boston is on all 6 lists that Wikipedia reports-which is kind of an accomplishment right there.

The Olympics seem to be like the old joke about a bank loan:
"They only give them to people who don't need them."

...or who for whom it is a close call between "not needing" the Os, or "needing them too badly"

Everyone gets that New York and London are in classes by themselves.

And then there's a Paris-Berlin-Hong Kong-Tokyo tier--at which point you've got 1 city per culture that led WWII or the UN immediately after, except for USSR/Russia/Moscow, which is too sad in other ways. Point is, though that that top tier doesn't "need" the Os either.

People also get that some places like Harvard, Stanford, and the Pentagon and Disneyland aren't in the city that gives its name to each's respective Olympic bid, but they share an International Airport. Close enough for the Global Ranking people, anyway.

Boston is right in the need/don't-need and famous-enough/could-be-more-famous sweetspot of host cities.
 
I think the issue with members of a private club is not the two weeks of competition, but the setting up the course to make it a competitive test for the top golfers of the world. It does little for the reputation of The Country Club to have golfers shoot in the low 60s because the course is unchanged from the set-up for the members.
 
stellarfun said:
tklalmighty, re: Blodgett pool. In the original master plan for Allston, Blodgett was to be demolished and rebuilt elsewhere. The sites of Blodgett, Lavietes, Dillon were to be the location of a new residential house. Then, came the Great Recession, and the hit to Harvard's endowment.

From what I have read, the only new Harvard athletic facility will be the replacement for Lavietes, and modest-sized at that, only 3,000 seats. It will go just north of the Samuel's building being built at Barry's Corner. A new residence house is apparently off the table, partly because Harvard is spending $1+ billion to renovate the existing river houses. I suspect Lavietes will be used for women's basketball or as a practice court.
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Ah, yes. I do think for the purposes of the Olympics, Soldier's field is going to have to be turned to an Olympic park. That means consolidating facilities, improving pedestrian flow, and creating key landmarks. I do feel like they could budget in some new facilities on the open end of Harvard Stadium. I'm not saying they need them in the long run, but it could be a worthwhile investment to several Harvard athletics programs.

Here's my vision: the land on which Murr, Blodgett, Lavietes, and Dillon sit could be used to build a superfacility of sorts. The southern 3/5 of the building would hold a new hockey arena, with permanent capacity around 6000, and room for temporary seating to bring it to around 10000 for the Olympics. A club level would also overlook Harvard Stadium, a la Conte Forum/Alumni Stadium. The northern 2/5 of the building would consolidate the functions of Palmer-Dixon, Murr, and Dillon, on about 3 floors.

Has anyone ever been inside Gordon? How feasible could it be to fit temporary seating inside the facility and adapt it for one of the hall or arena sports? From the images I see on Google, I would say it's feasible, but the roof may need to be raised to adequately fit the stands. It would be interesting trying to fit tennis in that facility. Wonder if the ITA/IOC would object to indoor show courts.
 
tklalmighty, Harvard is not going to pay for new facilities to function principally as Olympic venues. Harvard is unlikely to be willing to have somebody else pay for new or renovated facilities to function primarily as Olympic venues.

Why would Harvard or the IOC build a new hockey rink seating 6,000 when ice hockey is not a competed sport in the summer games?

As for Gordon, it is used primarily for indoor track. While Gordon has some indoor courts, Murr has more, and Beren, near the Soldiers Field curve, has about 20 outdoor courts, but no seating to speak of.
 
stellarfun said:
I think the issue with members of a private club is not the two weeks of competition, but the setting up the course to make it a competitive test for the top golfers of the world. It does little for the reputation of The Country Club to have golfers shoot in the low 60s because the course is unchanged from the set-up for the members.
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I went to look for precedent on this, but since Golf is new for 2016 there isn't any. Rio is building a course, but that could just reflect the state of golf courses in Brazil.

The Country Club has hosted both the Ryder Cup and the US Open, both of which will, in 2024, be populated by precisely the same golfers as will be in the Olympics (not the same caliber, the same people). I don't see any reason why it would have any problem making the course competitive. I don't recall the 1999 Ryder Cup being considered "too easy."

Now, do they want to shut down for six weeks mid-summer to set-up/take-down? Who knows. They've done it before, and they're not the only option. Golf courses are expensive, so Boston 2024 should ask all of the existing courses before building or improving anything. I assume all the executives and boosters are members somewhere (Bob Kraft lives down the block from The Country Club), so they may get some pull that way.
 
whighlander said:
Ruari -- I'm not sure what backwaters you lived in:

Let's investigate several categories of visitors to our provincial burg many of whom come here at sometime to go to college, work, sell / buy or participate in a conference /trade show or meeting:
  • High Technology crowd -- they are much more familiar with Boston / Cambridge than NYC or Philadelphia let alone Chicago or Atlanta
  • The same is true with anyone involved in the Physical Sciences, Medicine and education at all levels
  • past couple of decades Boston / Cambridge has been the nexus of Biotech and increasingly Traditional Pharmaceuticals
  • Financials -- Boston is on par with all but NYC / London in terms of money management
  • brewing Beer -- well represented in that
  • the American Revolution -- goes without saying
  • Victorian Architecture in the Back Bay and South End
  • Music -- many schools and of course the BSO and Pops
  • Art -- the MFA
  • MOS -- globally recognized
  • BPL one of the worlds great collections
  • Pro Sports
  • the Marathon
  • Head of the Charles

Your friends and acquaintances seemingly are involved in mining salt or processing Yak Butter?

PS: Faneuil Hall / Quincy Market with about 20 M visitors annually is a Top 20 global tourist site
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Yea, I know, I listed this stuff in my post. It's just my opinion that, considering this list, Boston is under appreciated at an international level and the Olympics will go along way towards rectifying this (whether that's needed or wanted is a different question). Again, just an opinion, and nothin wrong with processing yaks butter, it's a living!
 
Kraft belongs to Belmont and that place is marginal even by Mass Amateur standards.
 
equilibria, Kraft is a member of several clubs, The Country Club seems not to be one of them. It denied membership to former governor Patrick.

But if the members were willing to stand a season-long disruption, The Country Club would be a great venue. With regard to set-up I don't know if the tee boxes and the longer holes would work equally as well for women as for the men.
 
kmp1284 said:
It's a private club that members pay a considerable sum of money to be a part of. Blocking off the course and most club facilities for two weeks and forcing members to play on what will more closely resemble Franklin Park for the rest of the season is not in their best interests.
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I suppose that rules out the Ryder Cup too... Oh, wait!

If somebody argues against the Country Club wanting to host the Olympics they will have to explain '99 before. Same players, same (roughly) amount of time, same (roughly) prestige out of it, same preparation,...
 
Well, first off I don't think there's any comparison in prestige between Olympic golf which is a complete novelty and the Ryder Cup or US Open. I'm not going to speak for The Country Club but having attended the event and having spoken to friends who are members I know that a lot of people were disappointed following the 1999 Ryder Cup at the condition the course was left in as far as playability and the length of time that it took to recover.
 
kmp1284 said:
Well, first off I don't think there's any comparison in prestige between Olympic golf which is a complete novelty and the Ryder Cup or US Open. I'm not going to speak for The Country Club but having attended the event and having spoken to friends who are members I know that a lot of people were disappointed following the 1999 Ryder Cup at the condition the course was left in as far as playability and the length of time that it took to recover.
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Let's not overlook that (unless Boston wants to pay for security) the Olympics will be designated a 'national security event' and spectators attending ticketed competitions will be screened by the Secret Service. This would include members of The Country Club going to their own clubhouse.

And as Boston proposes to house some of the officials associated with the Olympics in college dorms / residence halls, at a time when said colleges are typically running their summer sessions, that may result in parts of a campus being placed behind a security cordon, and those entering the cordoned-off area would also be screened.
 
Equilibria said:
I went to look for precedent on this, but since Golf is new for 2016 there isn't any. Rio is building a course, but that could just reflect the state of golf courses in Brazil.

The Country Club has hosted both the Ryder Cup and the US Open, both of which will, in 2024, be populated by precisely the same golfers as will be in the Olympics (not the same caliber, the same people). I don't see any reason why it would have any problem making the course competitive. I don't recall the 1999 Ryder Cup being considered "too easy."

Now, do they want to shut down for six weeks mid-summer to set-up/take-down? Who knows. They've done it before, and they're not the only option. Golf courses are expensive, so Boston 2024 should ask all of the existing courses before building or improving anything. I assume all the executives and boosters are members somewhere (Bob Kraft lives down the block from The Country Club), so they may get some pull that way.
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I would just like to point out that The Country Club members are largely away "summering" by the sea or in the Berkshires in July and August. Taking over the course then is probably not a big inconvenience.
 
JeffDowntown said:
I would just like to point out that The Country Club members are largely away "summering" by the sea or in the Berkshires in July and August. Taking over the course then is probably not a big inconvenience.
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Put a sock in it. You have no clue what you're talking about. It isn't Caddyshack. Most of these people work and probably work a hell of a lot harder than you do.
 
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Greetings,

As a reminder, the Boston 2024 Citizens Advisory Group January meeting will be held on Wednesday, January 21st at 6:00 p.m. at the Boston Convention & Exhibition Center. If you plan to attend and have not already done so, please RSVP here. The BCEC is located at 415 Summer Street in Boston. Parking is available for a fee in the BCEC South Parking Lot. Directions to the BCEC South Lot and public transportation information are available here.

For those who cannot attend in person, the meeting will be webcast on our website - 2024boston.org. The schedule for upcoming CAG meetings will also be announced on Wednesday evening.

Please feel free to email us with any questions or concerns regarding the meeting. Thank you again for your engagement and participation.

Sincerely,
Boston 2024 Partnership
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I'll be attending this event this afternoon. Anyone else going? PM me if you want to meet up.
 
Not gonna be there in person, will watch online. Pretty sure the bod documents in some form are gonna be released at this meeting.
 
Weird turn of events:
Boston city employees told not to badmouth Olympics

By Michael Levenson GLOBE STAFF JANUARY 21, 2015

If you’re a Boston city employee, there’s now an official decree: don’t badmouth the Olympics.

Documents obtained by the Globe through a public records request to City Hall show Mayor Martin J. Walsh has signed a formal agreement with the United States Olympic Committee that bans city employees from criticizing Boston’s bid for the 2024 Summer Games.

The “joinder agreement” forbids the city of Boston and its employees from making any written or oral statements that “reflect unfavorably upon, denigrate or disparage, or are detrimental to the reputation” of the International Olympic Committee, the USOC, or the Olympic Games.

Instead, the USOC and the Walsh administration must “work cooperatively together to manage, complete, and promote” the city’s bid to the International Olympic Committee. Boston city employees “shall each promote” the city’s bid “in a positive manner,” the agreement adds.

Boston is among a host of international cities competing for the 2024 Games. The IOC is expected to pick a winner in 2017.

http://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2015/01/21/boston-city-employees-told-not-badmouth-olympics
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Reaction on UHub from Marty supporters and 2024 supporters is extremely negative. This decision could significantly decrease support for Marty & the Olympics.

http://www.universalhub.com/2015/walsh-bans-city-employees-criticizing-olympics
 
I think Marty is smarter and less tone-deaf than he seems. The environment is ripe for a lot of changes, but it requires a strong mayor who doesn't answer to the Herald commentariat. If he gets things done, his reelection should be pretty assured.
 
I haven't got my Globe log-in with me, so I can't click through their article to see if they linked to the agreement itself.

So at the risk of redundancy on datadyne's post, here's a link where you can see the joinder agreement:

http://www.masslive.com/news/boston...mit, this is just one doc of presumably many.
 
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