As long as the proposed Olympic stadium in Queens meets the technical requirements for the events that would be held there, NYC2012 will be permitted to present the plan to the International Olympic Committee when it votes on the 2012 Olympic city on July 6, the I.O.C. president, Dr. Jacques Rogge, said yesterday.
The next step in New York's attempt to salvage its Olympic bid is gaining approval from the governing bodies of the two sports that would use the stadium. Bid officials plan to travel to Europe this week to present stadium blueprints to track and field's international federation, the International Association of Athletics Federations, and soccer's ruling body, the Fédération Internationale de Football Association. Afterward, the full plan can be submitted for approval by the I.O.C.'s executive committee.
"The evaluation commission has a strict list of conditions to be met," Rogge said in a telephone interview from I.O.C. headquarters in Lausanne, Switzerland. "As long as the project meets all of those conditions, we will be happy to allow it."
NYC2012, the city's organizing committee, will have to reassure the I.O.C. that the new plan will not run into the political hurdles that thwarted the old one. Rogge said New York was in a much better position with an approved alternate plan in Queens than it would have been with an uncertain proposal on the Far West Side of Manhattan.
"I think this is very important; the I.O.C. insists on guarantees," Rogge said. "We want to evaluate cities on concrete plans, not fake promises."
The lack of a stadium had been a major obstacle for New York. Paris, which is considered the favorite to win the 2012 Games, already has a stadium. London, which, like Paris, received a favorable review by the I.O.C.'s evaluation commission last week, has approval to begin construction on a stadium if it is chosen.
A day after Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg announced that NYC2012 had reached an agreement with the Mets for a stadium that would house the team beginning in 2009 and could be converted for Olympic use, NYC2012 staff members flew to Kansas City, Mo., to work with HOK Sport, the architects chosen by the Mets to design the facility. The stadium would be built even if New York did not win the Olympics.
New York bid officials are pushing the timetable on the stadium so that everything is ready for the I.O.C. when it selects a host city for the 2012 Olympics from among New York, Paris, London, Madrid and Moscow.
Bloomberg plans to travel with Daniel L. Doctoroff, the deputy mayor and bid founder, to Ghana this week for a meeting of African Olympic officials, the last gathering of I.O.C. members before the July vote in Singapore. Also making the trip is David Dinkins, the former New York mayor. Bloomberg feels the need for help in selling the new plan to I.O.C. voters.
"I think the most important thing is they will look and say New York had a plan, it didn't work out and right away they got themselves up and they came right back with another plan," Bloomberg told reporters yesterday morning at an appearance at Fort Totten Park. "I'm optimistic."
Rogge said he was pleased the New York organizers were able to resurrect the bid so quickly. He had assured them last week that the I.O.C. executive committee would consider a backup plan, even though rules forbid cities from changing their bids this late. Rogge cited the unusual circumstances and his desire for New York to stay in the race.
"This shows the quality and dedication of the New York team," Rogge said yesterday.
That is the reaction Bloomberg and Doctoroff are hoping for from the rest of the I.O.C., which has heard nothing in the past week but tales of how the Olympic stadium plan for the Far West Side of Manhattan had failed.
NYC2012 also filed a response yesterday to a report released last week by the evaluation commission. NYC2012's executive director, Jay Kriegel, said the I.O.C. would not allow cities to comment on their responses until the I.O.C. releases them next week. Because the main criticism against New York was the lack of an approved stadium, NYC2012 was eager to have a new deal in place for its response. The I.O.C., however, is not expecting full details until next week.
Kriegel said NYC2012 was confident of an agreement with the federations governing track and field and soccer. Its planners had worked extensively with the federations on the Far West Side project and know the requirements of the sports.
But it will take an expert sales job to win over I.O.C. members because Doctoroff has spent the past few years pushing the attraction of having an Olympic stadium in Manhattan. The Queens stadium will have to be sufficiently impressive to overcome the loss of the more glamorous Manhattan site and its conversion from use as a baseball park.
Doctoroff and Bloomberg will push the area's proximity to the Olympic Village, its accessibility by mass transit and its history as the site of two Worlds Fairs and the former temporary home of the United Nations.
But no one believes the sales job will be easy.
"You have to be realistic that there are four other wonderful cities," Bloomberg said. "We've got to go and make our case."