Environmental Cost of the Winter Olympics under scrutiny (again)
Reuters
update us with some of the local impact of the forthcoming 2006 Winter Olympics in Turin. Amongst other examples, the village of Pregalato, site of new Ski Jump ramps, is described by one environmentalist as “buried under an avalanche of cement”.
Green activists see Pragelato’s two ski jumping hills as a symbol of Olympic folly — a venue built from scratch, in all likelihood left to crumble once the event is over, like so many stadiums and speed tracks around the world.
Wanda Bonardo of environmental group Legambiente in Turin rattled off a list of projects that enraged her:
The 1,400-meter bobsleigh track, which required hundreds of trees to be cut down; Olympic villages built on pristine mountainsides; the torrents of water that will be used to produce artificial snow; and, of course, the ski jumping hills.
Looks to us like an assessment of “could do better” so far…
