Estimates of Cross-Border Olympics Traffic
In July of 2003, The International Olympic Committee (IOC) announced its selection of Vancouver & Whistler, British Columbia as the host cities of the 2010 Winter Olympic Games. In the month following the announced selection of Vancouver for the 2010 Games, the International Mobility and Trade Corridor Project (IMTC)Core Group approved the following addition to its formal Objectives List:
“Pursue IMTC Objectives (...improve safety, mobility, and security in the Cascade Gateway) with specific attention to improvements that support efficient, predictable international travel to and from the 2010 Winter Olympic Games in British Columbia.”
In March of 2004, the Whatcom Council of Governments (WCOG), with support from the U.S. Federal Highway Administration’s Transportation Planning Capacity Building Program, organized and conducted a peer-exchange through which representatives from Whatcom County and Washington State spent three days meeting with transportation and event planners from Salt Lake City, Utah regarding the 2002 Winter Olympics held there. This exchange availed meaningful information not previously captured in published reports and assessments of those games. Information on Olympic attendee demographics, length-of-stay, and event-attendance patterns for the 2002 Games has been valuable for understanding the variables that will likely determine the influence of the Vancouver games on adjacent regions, travel patterns, and more.
The resulting spreadsheet analysis (See PDF document in the Resources section of this page) is based on information from both the Vancouver/Whistler Bid Book and several variables based on the 2002 Salt Lake City experience. To be sure, this analysis should be fine-tuned when and if pre-games demographic information is available from the Vancouver Olympic Committee (VANOC).
For More Information
Contact Hugh Conroy, Project Manager, at (360) 676-6974.