London Latest - First Olympic Park Legacy Event; Coe Hits Back at Report on Soaring Costs

(ATR) Olympic organizers confirm that a two-day cycling festival will be the first major legacy event to make use of the Olympic Park when it reopens in summer 2013.

Representatives from the London mayor's office, London & Partners, its events agency, joined officials from British Cycling and the Olympic Park Legacy Company at London’s National Theatre Thursday to announce the cycling scheme.

Kulveer Ranger, mayor Boris Johnson's environment director, told reporters that the mass participation event would be "a great legacy for the Olympic Park", which will be open to the public in phases from July 2013 following post-Games reconstruction.

"Boris [Johnson] threw down the gauntlet a few years ago when he said he wanted the city to be a cycling city. We introduced the Barclays hire scheme, the cycling highways, new parking. Now it’s about the future, and we’ve been working with the cycling industry to come up with a two-day festival," Ranger said.

He added: "The name is still up for grabs - today is not just a call out to get a delivery partner, it really is to say come and help us inspire Londoners to be cyclists, to use the greenest form of transport. It really is exciting."

The first day of the festival will involve a family fun ride that is expected to involve around 70,000 cyclists, who will bike around an eight-mile loop of closed roads around London’s iconic landmarks.

On day two, u to 35,000 amateur, club and elite cyclists will tackle a 100-mile course that will begin in the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park and be based on much of the route of the 2012 Games cycle road race.

Ranger also said that "lessons had been learned" from the 2012 road race test event held last year. "The test event taught us a hell of a lot. We learned how to handle things that we can improve," he said.

Iain Edmondson, head of major events at London & Partners, told Around the Rings about the lessons learned that can learned from the road race at London 2012 this summer.

Concerns have already been raised that the event will cause traffic chaos in London.

"This is a huge task. It’s a 100-mile race in one of the busiest cities in the world so it affects a lot of people," he said. "So what we need to do is make sure we communicate with those parties and make sure they can go about their daily business.

"And that’s something we can take from the Games to make sure they don’t see it as a disruption, but as a positive instead. If you look at the London marathon, pubs and businesses along the route come out and support it and that’s what we want for this event."

When asked about finding a delivery partner to invest in the event, Edmondson had earlier stated that although organizers sought complete investment, they still wanted the event to be publicly owned.

"Finding a delivery partner starts today, we have proposals in April and we’ll go through a rigorous process after that so we hope to have it all in place and wrapped up before the Games start," he said.

Coe Defends Olympics Budget

LOCOG chairman Sebastian Coe has hit back at reports that the cost of preparations for the Games could soar to as much as $37 billion.

An investigationby British broadcaster Sky Sports News claimed Thursday that the final cost of the Olympics would be over $18 billion and may reach $37 billion. It says the additional spend includes more cash on more anti-doping control officers, money for local councils for Olympic torch relay programs, governmental operational costs and cost of buying land for venues.

If the billions spent on security and intelligence services, counter terrorism funding and transport improvements were included, the project cost of the Games could top $37 billion, the report said.

But Coe insisted the anticipated cost remained within the government’s public sector budget for the Games, which was set at $14.5 billion in 2007. This includes venue construction and infrastructure projects.

"We will maintain a balanced budget to the completion of the project and the infrastructure will be delivered within the budget that has already been agreed by government," Coe told the Associated Press in Davos where he was promoting the London Olympics at the World Economic Forum on Thursday.

"Occasionally some things are slightly more than you expect. On a lot of occasions they’re slightly less than you expect, but overall those changes have taken place within that 9.3 billion pound envelope."

Coe refused to comment on the resignation of a commissioner for a watchdog monitoring Games preparations over LOCOG's controversial Dow Chemical sponsorship.

Meredith Alexander quit the Commission for a Sustainable London 2012 Wednesday night in protest against Dow’s links to the Bhopal 1984 gas leak at a Union Carbide plant, which killed over 15,000 people. Dow is sponsoring the $11 million fabric wrap that will encircle the 80,000-seat Olympic Stadium.

Coe told the AP that he recognized the "pain still felt around the disaster at Bhopal" but emphasised again what London 2012 officials have been saying for months, that Dow did not own or operate the plant when the disaster happened.

Security Provider Opens 2012 Recruitment Center

Official Games security provider G4S today opened the doors of its new London 2012 Recruitment Center today as it launched the biggest paid recruitment drive this century.

The world’s leading security solutions company will recruit around 10,000 security staff to work at the Olympics this summer. G4S employees will carry out a variety of tasks including bag and vehicle searching.

At the launch were Mark Hamilton, managing director of the G4S Olympic and Paralympic security operation, and London 2012 CEO Paul Deighton.

Already there have been applications from more than 20,000 hopeful recruits. Candidates will be asked to attend an interview at the recruitment center, where they will go through a rigorous screening and vetting process before their application is submitted to LOCOG for accreditation.

The center also serves as a training facility, with new recruits to be put through their paces and provided with role-specific training to ensure they are fully prepared for the Games.

Deighton said: "This recruitment drive offers a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for Londoners to take part in a world-class event and is a great way of bringing jobs to London and the UK."

Six Months Milestone

London 2012 organizers will stage various activities at the six months to go mark on Friday.

Around the Rings will be providing on the scene reporting from London.

Reported by Christian Radnedge and Mark Bisson

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