Jon Pack is a Brooklyn-based photographer whose work has been exhibited in galleries in the US and Europe, and has appeared on book covers from publishers including Simon & Schuster and Random House. His previous projects include the limited-edition book Out There; That Thing We Call Nature.

The first edition of Olympic Cities, published in 2007, provided a pioneering overview of the changing relationship between cities and the modern Olympic Games. This substantially revised and enlarged third edition builds on the success of its predecessors. The first of its three parts provides overviews of the urban legacy of the four component Olympic festivals: the Summer Games; Winter Games; Cultural Olympiads; and the Paralympics. The second part comprisessystematic surveys of seven key aspects of activity involved in staging the Olympics: finance; place promotion; the creation of Olympic Villages; security; urban regeneration; tourism; and transport. The final part consists of nine chronologically arranged portraits of host cities, from 1936 to 2020, with particular emphasis on the six Summer Olympic and Paralympic Games of the twenty-first century. As controversy over the growing size and expense of the Olympics, with associated issues of accountability and legacy, continues unabated, this book's incisive and timely assessment of the Games' development and the complex agendas that host cities attach to the event will be essential reading for a wide audience. This will include not just urban and sports historians, urban geographers, event managers and planners, but also anyone with an interest in the staging of mega-events and concerned with building a better understanding of the relationship between cities, sport and culture.

Hosting the Olympic Games reveals the true costs involved for the cities that hold these large-scale sporting events. It uncovers the financing of the Games, reviewing existing studies to evaluate the costs and benefits, and draws on case study experiences of the Summer and Winter Games from the past forty years to assess the short- and long-term urban legacies for host cities. Written in an easily accessible style and format, it provides an in-depth critical analysis into the franchise model of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) and offers an alternative vision for future Games. This book is an important contribution to understanding the consequences for the host cities of Olympic Games.

This volume provides an overview of the changing relationship between cities and the Olympic Games, starting from the year 1896. Blending critical conceptual insight with grounded case studies, this book, divided into three parts, explores the historical experience of staging the Olympics from the point of view of the host city.

The first edition of Olympic Cities, published in 2007, provided a pioneering overview of the changing relationship between cities and the modern Olympic Games. This substantially revised and much enlarged fourth edition builds on the success of its predecessors. The first of its three parts provides overviews of the urban legacy of the four component Olympic festivals: the Summer Games; Winter Games; Cultural Olympiads; and the Paralympics. The second part comprises systematic surveys of six key aspects of activity involved in staging the Olympics and Paralympics: finance; sustainability; the creation of Olympic Villages; security; urban regeneration; and tourism. The final part consists of ten chronologically arranged portraits of host cities from 1960 to 2032, with complete coverage of the Summer Games of the twenty-first century. As controversy over the growing size and expense of the Olympics, with associated issues of democratic accountability and legacy, continues unabated, this book’s incisive and timely assessment of the Games’ development and the complex agendas that host cities attach to the event will be essential reading for a wide audience. This will include not just urban and sports historians, urban geographers, event managers, and city planners, but also anyone with an interest in the staging of mega-events and concerned with building a better understanding of the relationship between cities, sport, and culture.

In 2013 and 2014, some of Massachusetts' wealthiest and most powerful individuals hatched an audacious plan to bring the 2024 Summer Olympics to Boston. Like their counterparts in cities around the world, Boston's Olympic boosters promised political leaders, taxpayers, and the media that the Games would deliver incalculable benefits and require little financial support from the public. Yet these advocates refused to share the details of their bid and only grudgingly admitted, when pressed, that their plan called for billions of dollars in construction of unneeded venues. To win the bid, the public would have to guarantee taxpayer funds to cover cost overruns, which have plagued all modern Olympic Games. The United States Olympic Committee (USOC) chose Boston 2024's bid over that of other American cities in January 2015-and for a time it seemed inevitable that the International Olympic Committee (IOC) would award the Games to Boston 2024. No Boston Olympics is the story of how an ad hoc, underfunded group of diverse and engaged citizens joined together to challenge and ultimately derail Boston's boosters, the USOC, and the IOC. Chris Dempsey was cochair of No Boston Olympics, the group that first voiced skepticism, demanded accountability, and catalyzed dissent. Andrew Zimbalist is a world expert on the economics of sports, and the leading researcher on the hidden costs of hosting mega-events such as the Olympics and the World Cup. Together, they tell Boston's story, while providing a blueprint for citizens who seek to challenge costly, wasteful, disruptive, and risky Olympic bids in their own cities.

Drawing upon historical, cultural, economic and socio-demographic perspectives, this book examines the role of a sporting mega-event in promoting urban regeneration and social renewal. Comparing cities that have or will be hosting the event, it explores the political economy of the games and the changing role of the state in creating post-industrial metropolitan spaces. It evaluates the changing perceptions of the Olympic Games and the role of sport in the global media age in general and assesses the implication of 'mega-event' regeneration policies for local communities and their cultural, social and economic identities, with specific reference to east London and the Thames Gateway.