GLITTER TO GOLDone

Athletes village, fast-tracked rail and M2 on Olympic bid hit list

AN athletes village on the Coast, a faster rail network and a second M1 highway will form part of a Queensland Games bid, the Bulletin has learned. Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk has softened her stance on a fast train network recognising it is vital transport infrastructure needed if the Sunshine State wins the right to host the 2032 Olympics.

The Games would also feature two athletes villages – one on the Gold Coast and in Brisbane, a source reveals.

THE Gold Coast has a major role in the 2032 Olympics bid, with revelations a Queensland Games envisions an athletes village on the Glitter Strip and second M1 to Brisbane.

The Games feature two athletes villages – a Gold Coast one and one in Brisbane, a source reveals.

Legacy transport infrastructure such as a faster rail network linking southeast Queensland and a second Gold Coast-Brisbane M1 Highway will also be built to cater for an Olympics and a population boom across the region.

A new world-class stadium with capacity for 80,000 people to watch the athletics and opening and closing ceremonies forms the centrepiece of a Queensland Games bid.

Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk has softened her stance on a fast train network recognising it is a vital transport infrastructure needed if the Sunshine State wins the right to host the 2032 Olympics.

A Gold Coast City Council spokesman yesterday said no specific sites had been selected yet for a 2032 Olympics Athletes Village but would be looked at later in the bid process.

Council of Mayors head Mark Jamieson and Federal Government Olympics representative Ted O’Brien have both said publicly faster rail is “critical’’ to an Olympics bid.

Ms Palaszczuk, Australian Olympic Committee president John Coates and Star Entertainment Group chairman John O’Neill led the state delegation which met International Olympic Committee president Thomas Bach last night.

For the first time, Mr Bach had invited a country to sit down with the IOC executive to work out whether a successful bid was feasible.

This is in stark contrast to the previous system where bidding countries spent tens of millions of dollars to try to win the bid.

Mr Bach wants “very few losers’’ from the new process. If the IOC likes what it hears, Queensland will proceed on its final bid which will go before the IOC just before the Tokyo Olympics in July next year.

A final decision would then be likely by 2022.

“The (Olympics) value assessment is being carried out and we will be looking at all transport options,’’ Ms Palaszczuk said.

Ms Palaszczuk and Mr Coates reinforced Australia as politically and economically stable, with a fine track record of delivering on big events including the Gold Coast Commonwealth Games last year.

Mr Jamieson said fast rail was important.

“You’ve got to be able to move big numbers of people for an Olympics and fast rail is the best option.

“From an economic point of view, we’d have a decade of preparation then two decades of significant prosperity beyond that.’’