MELBOURNE, Australia Basking in the glory of being named the world’s most desirable metropolis, Melbourne is hoping to bring a Summer Games to the city in the near future even though the country’s Olympic chief would prefer Brisbane to host the event.
Melbourne considers itself the country’s sporting capital, having staged the 1956 Olympic Games as well as being the home to a Formula One race, the Australian Open tennis tournament, an iconic cricket ground and the nation’s biggest horse race.
On Tuesday, Melbourne topped the Global Liveability Survey title for the second successive year and mayor Robert Doyle weighed in with a proposal that the city had the infrastructure in place to host a second Olympic Games.
“I don’t think there’d be another city in the world not hosting the Olympics that is as well prepared as we are right now,” Doyle told reporters less than 48 hours after London extinguished the flame of a successful but costly Summer Games.
“Think what we could do if we did dream large for 2024 or 2028.”
Doyle went to the extent of promising a cost-effective Games in the city which also hosted the 2006 Commonwealth Games.
“We would do it differently. We wouldn’t try to replicate bigger and better. We’d do it in a very Melbourne way,” he said.
“You find ways you can do things that are memorable that are typically us and within our budget.”
However, the Australian Olympic Committee (AOC) has already stated it was planning its next Olympic bid around Brisbane.
“It’s the best climate to host an Olympic Games in the window the International Olympic Committee is allowing,” AOC president John Coates told local media last month.
Queensland premier Campbell Newman welcomed Coates’s support on Tuesday, while maintaining the state’s immediate focus was on the 2018 Commonwealth Games being held on the Gold Coast.
“He (Coates) and I have spoken about these things in past years and he’s always been very supportive of Brisbane launching a bid as a city and obviously Queensland as a state needs to get behind that,” he said.
Doyle, however, would not be drawn into discussing Brisbane’s prospects as an Olympic venue.
“I don’t know about Brisbane’s infrastructure. I know we can (host it) and that’s the important thing,” he said.
Brazil’s Rio de Janeiro is hosting the next Summer Games in 2016, while either Istanbul, Tokyo or Madrid will be selected to host the 2020 Olympics at the 125th IOC session in Argentina next year.