david55

The news has been filled with stories about the low attendance to many of the Olympic events and how many hotels are far from sold out. One of the bi-products has been the very low numbers of visitors to the islands and places normally packed at this time of year because of all the pre-publicity about huge crowds, traffic,etc... Some of the Greek Islands are reporting 20% less tourism than last year....

jfe

Other than the opening ceremony, all the events I have see on TV look rather empty

gnedge

Same here, jfe. Apparently (and it must be true, because I heard it on TV), this weekend was a very large Greek holiday weekend which lowered attendance numbers. We'll see in a few days, I suppose.

ewrfox

I think the games have been a bust… One they have some 2.1 million unsold tickets, second the tickets are expensive… Third people are worried about terrorism…

And Greeks say they won’t do what the Aussies and Koreans done, by giving away free tickets, because its not fair to those that paid for the tickets…

obscure2k

When watching the games in Sydney, I felt a screaming need to return. I do not feel a screaming need to return to Athens. Also, the BCL venue really made me want to visit. Not so, with Athens.

onedog

I feel sorry for all the restaurants/gift shops etc. who bought product expecting a swarm of tourists but all they are seeing are thin crowds.

MrFurious

I hate to say it, but it looks like this will be a serious money loser.

clacko

looks like a lot of empty seats on tv, and that is a shame. however, with the many, many events [some of them sorta strange] going on, & the security hoopla, i can understand some people not going.

perhaps they should bring back the chariot races!

sapman986

eh... Are you sure you're not getting the Greeks and the Romans mixed up?

clacko

i heard that they were run in the olympics way back when [on tv, so it must be true, though i heard it on tom brokaw which has news in shallow].

when in greece, do as the romans do!

add...perhaps greece was part of the roman empire!

slippahs

I'd like to see where the bulk majority of visitors are coming from to the Olympics. It'd be interesting to see how they divide up.

aloha

Swiss Tony

I think it might be an issue that the games is now so big (and stadia are getting bigger too - all part of the bidding war) that many cities can't actually support the games.

You've got the people who will travel 000's of miles to watch & stay a week or so, but they will never fill all the seats. You need to ensure that there's enough residents and people within a couple of hours drive/train or whatever to come and fill the spare seats.

I don't know much about the Greek infrastructure, but with a population spread over numerous islands and the second city not easily accessible to ATH, the 'day trip' trade doesn't seem to be there.

The solution would seem to be to have a "country" as opposed to a "city" host the games. You can still have all the pomp and ceremony in one place, but given the number of athletes who didn't go to the opening ceremony this doesn't seem significant anymore.

You can then involve a far greater %age of the population and it also prevents the games from having to be in massive urban areas (i'm thinking South Calif, or South of England as examples here) for it to sell out/turn a profit...

Leumas

We've a family friend who runs a restaurant in Sydney. They said when they'd the Olympics the boom wasn't as much as expected (maybe people just expected too much, I don't know), the increase of people/business was more like a blip... A lot of locals left town to rent out their places for tourists, but there still wasn't quite enough (from what I understand). Maybe our local Sydney readers can share experience.

I also seem to recall that they reduced the size of Stadium Australia after the Games finished.

For this time, even 18 months ago, when I first looked at going, I could locate tickets no problems, it's finding a place to stay that proved difficult. I actually don't think the tickets are that expensive (when I looked at them) except for the 'glamour' sports.

hfly

It already is a tourism bust.

bluewatersail

I had wanted to go to the Olympics and had seriously considered going but all I got was negativity, and amazingly most of it was from Greek friends and travel agents here in the US. Greek friends basically told me to stay away, it'd be too hot, too crowded, too expensive, "it's going to be crazy". When I called the travel agent in January she didn't really want to be bothered with booking someone on an Olympic package. She sighed and said I'd have trouble getting a flight into Athens. When the travel agent finally got back to me the packages she offered were astronomically priced($25,000-$36,000) for TWO people not including airfare. Of course, I could have found cheaper packages but I asked myself if it was really worth the bother and made alternative plans for August.

Now I'm trying to watch the coverage on TV and the coverage is awful. When I see the empty stands subconsciously I tell myself it's not worth watching, the Olympics isn't what it used to be, and it will be no big deal if I never attend the Olympic Games in this lifetime. Sad.