Sapporo Apparently Tells JOC of Plan to Delay Olympic Bid

May 14, 2018

Tokyo- The city government of Sapporo is believed to have told the Japanese Olympic Committee on Monday that the northern city now aims to host the Winter Olympics in 2030, instead of 2026 as it initially planned.

"Even if the city changes its target to 2030, it has to move forward without losing enthusiasm," JOC President Tsunekazu Takeda told reporters after holding a closed-door meeting with Sapporo Mayor Katsuhiro Akimoto in Tokyo.

Akimoto told reporters that the city will continue to discuss the issue with the JOC. "It won't take long to reach a conclusion," he said.

Sapporo is one of seven cities that have officially expressed interest in hosting the 2026 Games, according to the International Olympic Committee's announcement in early April.

But in the prefectural capital of Hokkaido, there are calls from the local business community to delay the Olympic bid to 2030, given large-scale redevelopment projects including one to extend the Hokkaido Shinkansen high-speed railway line.

Furthermore, Sapporo seems to be at a disadvantage in the 2026 race, given that the hosts of the 2018 and 2022 Winter Olympics were also Asian cities, Pyeongchang in South Korea and Beijing, respectively, observers said.

All candidate cities for the 2026 event will file their bids by October this year, with the winner decided at an IOC general meeting in September 2019. Jiji Press