BARCELONA GETS 1992 SUMMER OLYMPICS (original) (raw)
Sports|BARCELONA GETS 1992 SUMMER OLYMPICS
https://www.nytimes.com/1986/10/18/sports/barcelona-gets-1992-summer-olympics.html
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- Oct. 18, 1986
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October 18, 1986
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After a week of suspense and months of political cajoling and arm-twisting, Barcelona, Spain, won the right to be host to the 1992 Summer Olympic Games and Albertville, France, was designated the site of the Winter Games in the same year.
The decisions were made in secret-ballot voting today by 85 of International Olympic Committee's 89 members. The winners were announced by Juan Antonio Samaranch, president of the I.O.C., who did not vote because he comes from Barcelona.
Thirteen cities were competing fiercely in the race to host the Summer and Winter Games, which have become a source not only of prestige, but also of badly needed funds for urban and rural development. The attractiveness of hosting the Games has surged since 1984, when the Los Angeles Summer Olympics made more than $200 million - the first sizable profit in the history of the modern Games.
Barcelona, which was competing for the fourth time, had been expected to win the Games. The city, which spent $7 million in promotion, has already built 80 percent of the facilities needed for the Games, which are expected to cost several hundred million dollars in public and private funds.
The selection of Albertville, a ski resort with a population of 18,000 near Switzerland and Italy, was seen as a consolation prize for France, which had tried to get the Summer Games for Paris. France campaigned by arguing that the committee should select Paris or Albertville to honor Baron Pierre de Coubertin, the Frenchmen who championed revival of the ancient games 100 years ago. Albertville is budgeting about $451 million for the Winter Games, which it hopes to finance - as Barcelona does the Summer Games - mainly through the sale of television rights. Pleas from Prime Ministers
Three prime ministers - Jacques Chirac of France, Felipe Gonzalez of Spain, and Ruud Lubbers of the Netherlands - pleaded their cities' cases before the I.O.C.
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