It’s no secret that there’s been interest in another Olympics for Lake Placid, New York.
The site of both the 1932 and 1980 Winter Games has been floated for years as a potential bidder on behalf of the U.S. Even before Utah was awarded the 2034 Winter Games, state lawmakers in New York were pushing for a feasibility study.
Now, it appears New York Gov. Kathy Hochul is on board.
New York’s interest could someday pit the Empire State against Utah, where Olympic organizers including Gov. Spencer Cox have made it clear they want to see the Winter Games return on more or less a regular basis.
Hochul is calling for the small community in the Adirondack Mountains to team up with New York City to host a future Winter Games. Just like at Italy’s 2026 Winter Games, dubbed the most widespread ever, venues would be several hundred miles apart.
“I’ve actually been having significant meetings on this, putting together the individuals who I would want to be part of a committee. It’s complicated, but we are up for it,” the N.Y. governor told The Athletic.
The New York Times sports outlet posted Monday that Hochul “insisted that there is ‘sincere’ political ambition” for bringing back a Winter Games, describing herself as “someone who will never forget the 1980 Olympics.”
She recalled working at a pizzeria as a college student during the famed “Miracle on Ice” men’s hockey match that saw the Soviet team defeated by the U.S., “listening to it on the radio and announcing to all the restaurant patrons what was happening play-by-play.”
Hochul said she’s been to Lake Placid “many times. To me, it is a shrine to the perseverance of American athletes at that time that we still have with us today. “I want to continue that celebration and have many more ‘Miracles on Ice’ in New York City and in Lake Placid.”
For her, “that’s the fascinating connectivity,” she told The Athletic. “What other part of the world can offer this opportunity to provide what New York City has but also the most beautiful place in the world, with the Adirondack (mountains)?”
What would a Lake Placid-NYC Olympics look like?
Details of the bid are yet to come. But there’s some clues in Lake Placid’s successful pitch to serve as a backup site for bobsled, luge and skeleton at this year’s Winter Games had Italy’s much-delayed new track not been finished in time.
The New York track turned out not to be needed, of course. But New York state was prepared to commit $30 million to hosting the competitions, according to a report last year in the Adirondack Explorer.
In addition to offering the use of the Mount Van Hoevenberg sliding venue, Lake Placid’s Olympic Regional Development Authority also planned to rent Rockefeller Center in Manhattan for “red carpet rink medal ceremonies,” the Adirondack newspaper reported.
A longtime advocate of a joint Lake Placid-New York City bid, state Assembly member Robert Carroll, said Madison Square Garden and other well-know arenas could be utilized for ice sports like figure skating, hockey, curling and speed-skating.
Also, the Brooklyn Democrat said in a USA Today Network op-ed, “iconic outdoor settings could push the boundaries of what a Winter Games looks like — Big Air at Citi Field or Yankee Stadium, or even a cross-country sprint through Central Park."
Combined with the upstate snow sports venues that New York taxpayers invested more than $600 million in ahead of hosting a 2023 event, Carroll said there would be “little to no new sports infrastructure” required for an Olympics.
However, he said another Olympics could spur improvements in the busy rail corridor connecting New York City to update communities as well as encourage the construction of new accommodations for athletes and others that later could be used as affordable housing.
While Carroll doesn’t specify which Olympics New York would bid for, the International Olympic Committee already has exclusive negotiations underway with Switzerland for the 2038 Winter Games that follow Utah’s, leaving 2042 as the next opening.
Even though the 2028 Summer Games are also in the U.S., in Los Angeles, he said in the op-ed, “There is no reason the United States, with its continental scale, world-class infrastructure and global reach, cannot host three Games within a 14-year span.”
Utah’s hopes for many more Winter Games
It’s too soon to say when Utah would try to host for a third time, said Fraser Bullock, president and executive chair of the Organizing Committee for the 2034 Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games.
“At this point, we’re just focused on 2034. When we do a great in 2034, it just bodes well for a future bid whenever that comes. But we’re not talking about that at this point,” Bullock said. “We’ve got a big opportunity in front of us, and we want to make sure we maximize our success.”
When it comes to helping Team USA athletes train to compete in Winter Games, he said Utah and Lake Placid are partners, both using former Olympic venues that have continued to be maintained.
“The fact that Lake Placid supports the Olympic and Paralympic movement is fantastic,” Bullock said. “What they’re doing in terms of year in and year out is great. But when it comes to hosting future Games, we may be competitors, maybe not.”
Utah offers “a very different model” for a Winter Games, he said, citing venues that are already in place from hosting the 2002 Winter Games, all located within an hour of a single athletes village at the University of Utah in Salt Lake City.
“We think that’s a great model for us and so we hope to have many Games, not only in 2034, but many Games down the road in the future,” Bullock said. That’s the case whether or not the IOC decides to rotate the Winter Games among a set group of hosts.
“What we have to be able to do is be awarded based on our merits,” he said. “As we’ve demonstrated before, we’ve got a strong model. In any future competition, whether its domestically or internationally, our model will continue to stand strong.”