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Without a doubt, Sydney sparkled like a jewel during the Olympic Games. Much of that sparkle was due to the Sydney City Council – one of the major players that rose to the challenge of making these the most memorable and well planned Games in history. This effort was recognized by the IOC who awarded Sydney the Olympic Cup. This award usually goes to an institution or association that has rendered distinguished service to sport or contributed successfully to the promotion of the Olympic ideal.
Geoffrey Williams from the City of Sydney was proud of the city’s contribution. “We put together a program of beautification and planning which allowed us to deal with increased pressures during the Games and made it a pretty, vibrant city,” he said.
There were a number of projects in the entertainment and events area where Council worked in combination with other authorities. Council worked with the Olympic Coordination Authority (OCA) in the organisation of the Olympic Live Sites. Council did much of the design work and programmed and booked the entertainment on four of the six sites before handing the program over to the OCA for implementation.
The Olympic Athlete’s Parade was joint exercise with the Australian Olympic committee with the Council providing expert input learnt from managing previous street parades. Mr Williams said “We made suggestions regarding the parade and the OCA ran the event. We also presented the keys to the city, and were responsible for crowd control and traffic management, and produced the event at Town Hall. It was a challenge fitting the 950 strong Olympic Team in front of Town Hall”, and still having room for spectators.
The city was prepared for the congestion, due to an even larger crowd having gathered only two weeks earlier to watch the Torch Relay make its way to Town Hall. “I’ve never seen a crowd like that in Sydney. We were genuinely surprised because we felt that Sydney’s characteristic blasé attitude would prevail. And the torch had already been run through hundreds of kilometers of Sydney suburbs with huge crowds watching – 65,000 at Pennant Hills and 100,000 at Parramatta".
“The Torch Relay here was a unique event – we commissioned a special cauldron to be built and created a unique event to celebrate the torch’s arrival,” Mr Williams said.
For a start the torch passed along George Street twice on its historic circumnavigation of the city centre and the City had to control tens of thousands of people for the one and three-quarter hours between torch appearances. Their solution was an Olympic concert in front of the Town Hall, which worked a treat.
The City also organized other street entertainment during the Olympics, designed to capture people’s attention as they moved through the city streets. The Council reinvented their busking and vending policy to ensure that all entertainment was appropriate and no hawking occurred. Street vendors and buskers who ignored the rules had their goods confiscated. The public could donate money to a street entertainer, but buskers were not allowed to sell anything, such as CDs.
Mr Williams said that the policy ensured that city retailers did well. “We learnt from Atlanta. The Americans sold space to all sorts of vendors to make money – street stalls were everywhere and their retailers suffered,” he said.
Mr Williams agreed that the city’s Olympic involvement – from the beautification of the city through to the volunteer parade, was extensive. In fact the City was so keen to ensure their hard work was rewarded with a smooth running Olympic period that the Council established a special Operations Centre.
The Operations Centre was the point of contact for every department within Council and for other agencies involved in the city Olympic program. For months before the big event Council staff worked to prepare strategies and procedures for each area of jurisdiction.
“We wanted to make sure that if there were any problems, no matter how small, that the Operations Centre would know immediately and take action to remedy the situation,” Mr Williams said. It was a plan that ran like clockwork.
Council executives met each morning of the Games at 7.30 am to review the previous day’s processes, ready to make changes wherever it was needed. The Operations Centre developed four reports daily to keep managers informed. “We were geared up to solve every problem – but there were none!” Mr Williams said.
It was a sign of just how well the Games had been organized.
The City is also involved in the Paralympic Games, through the Para Torch Relay, receptions, the flag ceremony and another athlete’s parade. And the planning which proved so vital during the Olympics has allowed everyone to breathe easy through the “Paras”.
“Our Olympic success comes down to good planning. We will now see other countries approach Australia and Australian companies with greater confidence,” Mr Williams said.
He also believes that the Australian public will demand a level of excellence they may not have previously. And is Australia ready for that challenge? “Absolutely – we’ve proven ourselves.”
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