Chicago Olympic bid: What’s at stake for Rockford?

Local officials say a Chicago Olympics’ effect on the area would be felt for years.

By Mike DeDoncker
ROCKFORD REGISTER STAR

ROCKFORD — Local officials are confident the world couldn’t come to Chicago for an Olympic Games without benefitting Rockford.A first step in whether that opportunity arrives is expected to be announced today when the U.S. Olympic Committee chooses to support either Chicago or Los Angeles in a bid to host the 2016 Summer Olympic Games.

The intent of the early selection is to give the United States choice a leg up in preparing its case for 2009, when the International Olympic Committee makes the final decision on the host city.“It would be absolutely beyond people’s wildest dreams,” Chicago/Rockford International Airport Executive Director Bob O’Brien said.

Local leaders in several areas agreed and said a boon to the airport, greater priority for road and other public works projects, area-wide recognition for the community, increased business for motels and restaurants, support for a much-needed new building at the Indoor Sports Center and possible impetus for a kayaking and extreme sports center on the river are among items at stake for Rockford in today’s USOC decision.O’Brien said he envisions Rockford handling large numbers of corporate aircraft and charter jets carrying up to 300 to 400 passengers for a Chicago-based Olympiad.

“In conjunction with the Olympics and the buildup to it, Rockford airport would be on a par of like when the Experimental Aircraft Association is in Oshkosh, Wis. We would be the world’s busiest airport for that period.“We are very strategically located, and we would outpace (General Mitchell International Airport) Milwaukee by 10 times, if Milwaukee was considered a reliever for Chicago.”

John Groh, executive vice president of the Rockford Area Convention and Visitors Bureau, said it’s incumbent on Rockford “to stick up its hand and get involved” because the Olympics in Chicago would mean upgrades in transportation and quality of living infrastructure leading to regionwide economic development opportunities that last long after the Olympics are gone.

“The sheer numbers of people involved with an Olympics would require a need for transportation because they would not all be able to stay in downtown Chicago,” Groh said. “Whether there was a need to provide practice areas or living accommodations, the connections of airports, roads, bus routes all would be important.”

He said passenger rail service and high-speed rail service have been “in the loop” of discussions between Rockford and Chicago officials raising the possibility that items that have been on Rockford’s wish list for decades could suddenly become part of Chicago’s political priorities.

“We have some good facilities here,” Groh said, “but are they up to Olympic scale? Probably not. But they could be built or improved to serve the citizens first and also be scalable to Olympic caliber.”Rockford Park District Executive Director Tim Dimke said he expects Chicago will try to keep the Games’ venues as close to its downtown as possible, but believes Rockford will be able to fill a role for teams seeking practice areas before they head to Chicago.“Anything we could pull out here would showcase our abilities to pull together major venues and major events with hotels and motels, restaurants and the playing fields,” Dimke said. “That kind of experience should put us high on the list as Chicago looks around for communities to assist them.”

Dimke said the soccer fields at both Sportscore sites and the Indoor Soccer Center, including a proposed $7 million building to enclose a full-size 200-by-85 yards soccer field, could serve as practice or preliminary-game sites for Olympic teams.Groh said 1994 World Cup soccer teams used Rockford as a practice site before competing at Chicago.Dimke said a new building at the Indoor Sports Center would serve local soccer which already presents “a phenomenal demand for space. They’re crying for more indoor space,” Dimke said. “We’re talking about a summer Olympics, so a building like that wouldn’t be used as extensively at that time of year. We might be able to modify it to connect to the Olympics.”

Tom Graceffa, past president of Rockford YMCA Rowing Club, said members of the club have discussed the possibility that “the Rock (River) could be a very good venue for the teams to practice before the Games because, other than Lake Michigan, there’s not a lot of big water around.

“We could easily accommodate the U.S. teams and, since it’s really not that far of a drive, some of the teams from other countries.”

The rowing club also has experience handling a large event after hosting the Head of the Rock Regatta for the past 21 years. The event drew more than 1,700 competitors and 530 boats in 2006.Graceffa said the river wouldn’t qualify as a venue for the Games because, of course, it has a current and Pierce Lake at Rock Cut State Park is too short to be considered for the races, which are up to 2,000 meters long.

If Rockford attracts rowing practices, he said, “it could be the boulder that starts to roll downhill for establishing a Midwest rowing center in Rockford for rowing, kayaking and whitewater rafting.”

Groh said David Preece, the convention and visitors bureau’s president and CEO, is part of a group that the mayor’s office has asked to study the feasibility of a proposed kayaking and indoor extreme sports center in the former Ingersoll building at the southeast edge of the Chestnut Street bridge.

“It’s a matter of scalability,” Groh said. “If it is to serve the citizens and visitors, what could be the need? But, if we want to scale it for the Olympic Games, what would it be necessary to do?”Groh said he expects that, if Chicago is chosen, Mayor Richard Daley and a committee he has chosen will intensify their work on the Olympics immediately and that Rockford Mayor Larry Morrissey will assemble a Rockford committee to work with them.

“On the bottom line, these kinds of things are about what you make of them,” O’Brien said. “If people see it for what it is, it could be spectacular.”