 |
The President and CEO for Pyeongchang2018 Jin-sun Kim. Photo by Getty Images
 |
SOCHI, February 27, 2014 -
Pyeongchang 2018 received the Olympic flag from Sochi 2014 during the Closing
Ceremony of the XXII Winter Olympic Games at the Fischt Stadium on sunday.
The
celebrations started with the handover from the Major of Sochi Anatoly Pakhomov
to the IOC President Thomas Bach and then to Mr. Lee Seok-rae during the
Closing Ceremony. The revels continued carried on Tuesday, february 25, when
the Pyeongchang 2018 delegation landed in Seoul airport a moment that was
broadcast live by the Korean Television Broadcasting.
The President and CEO for
Pyeongchang2018 Jin-sun Kim is clear on what he hopes to lead his team to.
Compact games
To impress the world the
PyeongChang 2018 Organizing Committee plans to host the most compact Games in
the history: "All the Venues, the Stadium, the Main Press Center (MPC) and
International Broadcasting Center (IBC) will have a maximum distance of 30
minutes by driving,” explained Jin-sun Kim POCOG President & CEO .
“Also to reach the MPC, IBC,
Olympic Family Hotel or stadium from whatever part of the Park it will take
really a short time". In Pyeongchang, as in the Russian winter Olympic
capital, there will be a Sea and a Mountain Cluster.
Sochi lessons
The Pyeonghchang 2018
delegation was in Sochi for the duration of the Sochi 2014 Winter Olympic Games
and will stay through the Paralympic Games starting February 7.
"In these days we have
worked hard to learn more and more from Sochi's experience,” said Kim.
“ When we have received the
Olympic flag from them, PyeongChang 2018 is already begin and we want to get
the whole world on board".
Between the
"lessons" learnt from the Russian experience there is also the great
enthusiasm shown by the Sochi 2014 young volunteers: "I really much
appreciate the natural smile of the Russian volunteers,” noted the President
“We want to prepare and
deliver our Games following this example of good attitude between the
people"
Seoul 1988
In thirty years, a generation
gone by, the Republic of Korea has managed to host again the Games: from the
Summer Games in Seoul 1988 to the Winter Games in Pyeongchang 2018.
"For us it is the
perfect closing of our Olympic Dream - explained the CEO.
“The last time the world knew a developing
Korea from the political, economical and cultural point of view, now 30 years
later we are going to show the world a truly developed country Korea. It is
such a meaningful achievement for us, we feel proud. I personally hope to have
North Korean athletes coming to our Games. Another goal we want to achieve is
to show the world how much the Winter Sports interest has grown in Asia in
these last years, we are a window of opportunity for Asia.”
Managing the costs
How much will the Winter
Games cost in Korea? The Sochi 2014 Winter Games have hit a record in terms of
costs with their "more than 50 billions dollars" to transform the
whole Krasnodar Region through the Games opportunity.
"We are spending in total 9 millions,”
detailed the CEO.
"We have a POCOG budget for
Games operation determined in 2 billion USD and a "Non POCOG" budget
of 7 billion USD which includes private investments, facilities, transport
infrastructures and the project of the High Speed Railway. Differently from
Sochi we have started our work with many existing facilities, and for us it is
fundamental the post Games use of them. We are developing various different
plans for several venues, private owned, tourism: for instance the indoor ice
venues are going to be converted in multi purpose structure to be used as
school gym rather than for general use.”
Media requirements
"We know that an important part of the
Olympic Games is represented by the media working on it, we really appreciate
the involvement of journalist covering the Games. That's why we have projected
the construction of media village in the coastal cluster respecting all the
requirements coming from the IOC. In the Mountain Cluster we will use the
existing facilities to construct the Media Accommodation. For what concerns the
MPC and IBC the idea is to have a preeminent post-use of the buildings that
have to be efficient and reusable after the end of the Games.”
This part though is still in
the designing stage. "We are going to do all of our best to support the
media activity pushing on the advanced technologies that Korea can offer,” said
the CEO.
“We will have 24 hours a day
of information, an efficient system of transportation for media and free
Wi-Fi".
Security
During the closing press
conference of Pyeongchang 2018 the important theme of safety was a concern for
the journalists. "We know that security is the most important element for
our Games success,”answered President Kim .
“The Republic of Korea is one
of the world's safest countries, however, considering the special nature of the
Olympics, a security committee headed by the prime minister is already in
operation."
Pyeongchang tried twice to
get the Winter Games finally achieving this goal.
"For me it has been a
dream to take the Olympics back in Korea and a kind of destiny to be involved
in the project,”Kim summed up his feeling on the games.
“I feel a big responsibility:
we want to deliver successfully our Games athletes-oriented.”READ THE STORY ON www.aipsmedia.com
