Winter Olympic City Tour | Sapporo: Becoming a "World City" with the Winter Olympics

(Text/Yang Ting, Wang Zijiang, Yang Guang)

Nearly a century has passed since the first Winter Olympics, the 1924 Summer Olympics in Chamonix. In the past 100 years, more than 20 cities around the world have successfully hosted the Winter Olympics. On the occasion of the upcoming opening of the Beijing Winter Olympic Games, the reporter of "Reference News" takes you into a series of "Winter Olympic Cities" such as Pyeongchang, Sochi, Vancouver, Turin, Nagano, Sapporo, etc., to observe what changes the Winter Olympics have brought to the host cities, and how these cities inherit and carry forward the spirit of the Winter Olympics.

In 1972, the Winter Olympics were held in Sapporo, the capital of Hokkaido, Japan. The Sapporo Winter Olympics is the first Winter Olympics to be held outside of Europe and the United States, and Japan's attention can be imagined. Sapporo, which had a weak sense of existence, has since become a well-known city in Japan, and the city's infrastructure and other aspects have developed tremendously.

"When the Winter Olympics were held, Sapporo had a population of about 1 million, and now it has increased to about 2 million." Yujiro Kitagawa, head of the Coordination Department of the Bidding Promotion Department of the Sapporo Municipal Sports Bureau, said in an interview with the "Reference News" reporter a few days ago: "The development of Sapporo City in the past 50 years has taken the Winter Olympics as a very important opportunity. For example, the subway in Sapporo City was opened in 1972, the expressway from Chitose Airport to Sapporo was opened that year, and the city's underground streets were opened when the Winter Olympics were held. It can be said that the holding of the Winter Olympics 50 years ago was of great significance to the development of Sapporo. Sapporo suddenly became a world city. ”

"The Olympics brought about the modernization of Sapporo." Masashi Abe, honorary curator of the Sapporo Olympic Museum, recalled the past and told reporters that if he did not watch the Sapporo Winter Olympic Games, he might work in summer sports such as baseball. After elementary school, Abe began to learn to ski, began to participate in ski jumping competitions in the third grade of elementary school, was selected for the national team at the age of 19, and then participated in the Winter Olympics for three consecutive times, and finally won the Nordic double-necked championship at the 1994 Winter Olympics in Lillehammer.

Yaso Abe is just one of millions of people who are affected and inspired. The hosting of the Winter Olympics has allowed Sapporo snow sports to be widely developed and have been a part of people's lives ever since. After Sapporo's successful bid to host the Winter Olympics, the local government included ski lessons in elementary school curricula. Kitagawa also told reporters: "Now almost everyone in Sapporo can ski. ”

With the help of the Winter Olympics, Sapporo has become a ski resort around the world, and the ski resort that hosted the Winter Olympics in that year attracted a large number of ski enthusiasts every year, and skiing became an important pillar industry in Sapporo.

Sapporo Temebo Ski Resort still retains the athletes' restaurant and torch platform when the Olympic Games were held (in 2019 te te ski resort built a new Olympic ski center), and the five ring signs at the top are reminiscent of the scene of the Winter Olympics 50 years ago.

According to industry insiders, Sapporo or Hokkaido and the Japanese government have not yet fully finalized Sapporo's bid to host the 2030 Winter Olympics, but there is such a concept. Yujiro Kitagawa, who is currently in charge of Sapporo's bid for the 2030 Winter Olympics and paralympic games, said that Sapporo was expected to bid for the 2026 Winter Olympics and made a lot of preparations for it, but in 2018, Hokkaido had a major earthquake, and the priority compared with the bid for the Winter Olympics was the revitalization of the affected areas, so the bid target was changed to 2030. Since then, Kitagawa and others have begun to re-discuss and review the plan.

Kitagawa said that in the near future, the 50th anniversary of the opening of the Sapporo Winter Olympics, a series of commemorative activities will be held throughout the city. More importantly, Sapporo hopes to take the opportunity of commemorating the 1972 Winter Olympics to help bid for the 2030 Winter Olympics.

Source: Reference News Network