Olympics: London braced for world's greatest show

this gotta be the worst olympics in history. so many complaints but doesnt make it to western media cuz its hosted by a western country. if it were in china, u bet there will be sh*tloads of negative news coverage. traffic sucks, beds sucks, so many mistakes screwing athletes, and dont even have bathrooms in basketball court. so unprepared.
 
ROUBINI: 'The London Olympics Are An Economic Failure As London Is Totally Empty'

ROUBINI: 'The London Olympics Are An Economic Failure As London Is Totally Empty'

Gus Lubin | Aug. 5, 2012, 7:41 AM | 20,644 | 44

Economist Nouriel Roubini is tweeting doom about the London Olympics this morning.

From @Nouriel:​
  • UK policymakers scared so much folks before the Olympic that London is a deserted city: non-olympic tourists are away; londoners are gone!
  • The Olympics are an economic failure as London is totally empty:hotels, restaurants, streets. They scared all off with crowd excess warnings
  • By scaring every1 to stay out of London with warnings about too many people coming here it turns that London is totally empty, a zombie city
  • RT @NotgiamattiThe Yogi Berra effect! Nobody goes there, it's too crowded.
  • The West End - usually packed on any Saturday night - was an empty waste land last nite: barely a soul to be found in theaters, bars, etc
  • They scared away all non-olympic tourists that pack london all summer;they pushed most londoners to escape;they told 2million to work @ home
  • RT @_garrilla that's the 'olympic economy' - all dispacement & deadweight (oh, and hot air)
Meanwhile London retailers are begging the transport system to stop warning about congestion problems, according to Telegraph's Graham Ruddick.
Retail chief Richard Dickenson told Ruddick: “We know there is a displacement effect. Instead of normal tourists you get sports tourists, we knew that. But we didn’t expect the impact on the London catchment and commuters."

London taxi drivers have reported a 20-to-40 percent drop in income this month, with industry representative Steve McNamara calling the Games "a complete and utter disaster."

Don't miss: 43 signs that the London Olympics will be a disaster


http://www.businessinsider.com/roub...mic-failure-as-london-is-totally-empty-2012-8

 
I was told by a few people that a lot of the hotels in London have already dropped their hotel prices back to essentially pre-Olympics prices..Even a Hilton hotel in central London has offered 40 pounds for a night of stay..Also, a lot of Londoners have decided to go away from London to avoid all the busyness..
 
As a Londoner (well ok Wimbledon) and working in a Hotel I would agree that Hotel trade is slow and not up to the pre Olympic hype. We did not put prices up for the Olympics and we were lucky enough to host the USA Cycling team so I guess its down to the sales team to grab what business they can. However I do not agree with the last statement, from my experience a huge amount of people living around the UK have come into London to see the sights and atmosphere that normally would not have bothered and I am not aware of any 'Londoners' that left to avoid it all - everyone I have spoke to has been proud to host this and would not dream of missing this opportunity.
As to the comment on Western media covering up, seriously! we have the worst tabloids in the world - trust me they love nothing more than to target someone or report the negatives and there was alot of sniping before the games. But once the games started everyone now just wants it to be good. As to the Traffic comment - Its one of the oldest cities in the world preserved as best as can be under the circumstances and not designed for cars or even a fraction of the current population so yes there is going to be queue's - its part of city life. I would rather live in an Historic city and Queue than some modern city where every block looks the same but hey, at least the there are wide roads....
Ok have finished now :-)
 
When we started to explore the possibility of joining others to watch the Olympics in London a year or so ago, it seemed many things were stacked against us. High hotel rates, expensive tickets that cannot be bought easily for foreigners, transportation woes, etc. So we decided to stay home to watch the many events on TV.

I'm afraid too much negatives were publicized long before the Games to discourage foreign visitors.
 
Thats a real shame Loh. I think the accomodation could have been sorted to budget as there are alot of options with places to stay at all levels.Transportation on the underground has been perfectly useable so far. However I agree the ticket system is too expensive and frankly the ticketing website is rubbish and at best frustrating even when you know exactly what you want. I was lucky enough to see the WS semi and MD Bronze match and the whole of one side of the Arena seemed to be for staff or corporate poeple and was pretty much empty - very upsetting knowing there were no tickets available to buy and I paid £95 each just for half a day. On the plus side I stayed at the Hilton where the players stayed right out side the arena for £68 and got to mingle with the stars which was a real bargain!
 
For badminton event, from my experience going there on 5 days and abt 6-7 sessions and nearly every day just to see the crowd/happening on the outside:

- Transportation-wise, it was okay. First few days were a bit quiet. But there were some days where there would be people and spectators returning/going all at once to either/both Wembley Stadium and Arena..On a couple of occasions, we ended up in a sea of people trying to get on the Tubes, all at the same time, simply because there was a soccer match which also ended at the same time...
Going to/from Wembley area to/from the Olympic Park (Stratford) area was definitely a haul..
- Accommodation-wise, yes, if one can't find a bargain place to stay, one just has to deal with the overpriced hotel prices...
- Ticket-wise, i believe there were still badminton tickets available for sale up til the last few days but one has to go online and reserve the tickets (and it wasn't easy); eventhough there was a ticket box office (which was only used for people to pick up tix). I would say it was a bit easier to get than the ones in the 2008 Beijing OG which can only be bought thru touts or individuals ....But yes, the organizer could've done a better job in selling tickets @ the box office (how? that i don't know)...otherwise, yes, if one can't get them online, one has to deal with touts trying to sell tickets or thru other individuals..
- Re the (mostly empty) seating area nearby the press area, where the players, team officials, sponsors have been assigned & reserved, were pretty much full on the last day (Sunday). I guess the organizer/players decided to sell them on the last day..Overall, the arena was packed every single day starting from Day 1..
- Security-wise, it was quite tight but overall comfortable.
 
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