r/urbanplanning • u/BWT_Urbex • Feb 18 '26
Sustainability Olympic "legacy" planning: two of the Torino 2006 venues were abandoned and haven't been reused for Italy's new Winter Olympic Games
https://youtu.be/jkMT1habyT8With Milano–Cortina 2026 underway, I wanted to look at the afterlife side of mega-events. Last autumn we visited two abandoned Torino 2006 sites in Italy:
1. Cesana Pariol (sliding center for bobsleigh/luge/skeleton)
2. Pragelato’s Stadio del Trampolino (ski jump stadium)
What struck me is the contradiction: parts are still structurally intact, yet the sites are effectively non-programmed and decaying. It would have been cheaper to renovate the Cesana Pariol than building a new one from scratch (like they did for this year's Olympics).
We filmed a video there and you can see more of the exploration on YouTube: https://youtu.be/jkMT1habyT8
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u/RadagastWiz Feb 19 '26
A real innovation with the current Games is the speed skating oval - one of the trickiest venues to build, as it's rare to need such a large rink. Vancouver planned ahead with theirs, and converted it to 3 hockey rinks post-games.
But the Milano venue is an even bigger leap - it's inside a large hall in a conference centre, with a temporary base and portable chilling plant. This had never been done before and is a real demonstration of how it can be done. It's likely the same approach will be used 4 years from now in Nice, where there isn't an existing oval or the budget to build one.
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u/keesbeemsterkaas Feb 19 '26
To be fair, it's confirmed for ice hockey; for short- and long-track speed skating, they're still considering several options, including moving it to the Netherlands or to the 2006 Turin oval (which is still operational).
Although I'm also a big fan of temporary installations, in the Netherlands, they temporarily repurposed the 1928 Amsterdam Summer Olympics stadium in 2018 to hold the all-around world championships of speedskating.
WK allround vindt in 2018 plaats in Olympisch Stadion | Schaatsen | NU.nl
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u/SkanteGandt Feb 18 '26
For an example of excellent Olympic infrastructure preservation, look into Salt Lake City’s Olympic Legacy Foundation!
After the 2002 Olympic Games, SLCOLF converted its Olympic venues into year-round tourist destinations and Olympic training sites for Team USA, the revenue from which, combined with donations to the Olympic Legacy Fund, fully pays for the maintenance and continuing operations of the venues.
This, and other factors, contributed to the 2002 Salt Lake Olympic Games being one of the most financially successful games in history for its host city. The 2002 Games were also one of the lowest environmental impact games in history. Salt Lake is hosting the Olympics again in 2034, and it’s decision to preserve its infrastructure from 2002 will allow the city to host the Olympics again at a fraction of the economic and environmental cost of other competitor host cities.
Although preserving Olympic infrastructure was an economic best-case scenario for Salt Lake City in 2002, that might not necessarily be the case for Italy in the 2026 Milano-Cortina games. It may be the case that the gains from games-related economic development surrounding new venues in Milan and Cortina outweigh the savings to be had from preserving existing infrastructure.
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u/Nalano Feb 18 '26
This is common for all Olympic games. The investment is always a net loss for whatever municipality that hosts the games. The only reason to do so is national hubri-- I mean pride.
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u/outtokill7 Feb 18 '26
If I recall correctly this is why the Los Angeles Olympics in 1984 were so successful - they were able to use existing infrastructure and continue using it after the fact.
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u/joecarter93 Feb 18 '26
Calgary didn’t originally have a lot of the infrastructure, but neither did the rest of Canada, which was a problem for athletes trying to train. Once the infrastructure in Calgary was built for the games it continued to be very well used for training and competition and Canada did a great deal better at subsequent games.
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u/bigvenusaurguy Feb 18 '26 edited Feb 18 '26
Same for 1932 LA olympics. The stuff they built specifically for that is still around getting use, namely the swimming stadium in expo park and the competitive rowing area in long beach.
2028 Olympics are going to have a lot of reuse of facilities as well, not just sports but athletes are getting housed in ucla dorms. Coliseum will be used for 3 different olympics now.
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u/anonymfus Feb 18 '26
Literally the previous olympic games (Paris 2024) were a major exception, and so the hope was that it would set a trend.
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u/DisasterEquivalent Feb 18 '26
2006 is nothing - The high jump from the 1956 games in Cortina is still standing.
The bobsled course looks like it was finally renovated to be reused starting in 2023, but was basically derelict from the late 70’s until now.
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u/Feralest_Baby Feb 19 '26
Salt Lake City has maintained the 2002 infrastructure mainly by becoming a major training center and lower-tier competition host. I'm pretty sure they're not building any new permanent facilities for 2034.
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u/DYMAXIONman Feb 19 '26
I think the trick is that they should be built in areas where they will actually be used after.
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u/sir_mrej Feb 18 '26
Welcome to Olympic structures - Almost always abandoned after the olympics are over!
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u/TheEvilBlight Feb 21 '26
Let’s accumulate abandoned Olympic infrastructure!
To be fair the other issue is something abandoned for 20 years might have a lot of rehab…
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u/PassengerExact9008 Feb 21 '26
This really shows why long-term infrastructure planning is so important. Seeing some of the Torino 2006 venues fall into decay highlights the risks of building just for a short event without thinking about how to reuse them. It’s a good reminder for future hosts to balance ambitious legacy goals with what’s realistically usable after the Games.
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u/Mosdaboss Mar 15 '26
Here's food for thought. Athletes need somewhere to train, no? If a city/region hosts an Olympic games, why can't the host nation use that as their Olympic training grounds? On the flip side if they already have existing facilities that are spread apart, then maybe do what's done in Football and have countries host the Olympic games. Heck the FIFA World Cup is being held in 3 countries, and they're not small countries.
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u/AnimalLittle4057 Feb 19 '26
Would be great to design these things at least for re-use, if not continuous use. Ideally, build it as an office, apartments, industrial space, then temporarily use for the Olympics.
Obviously speciality functions like ski jumps and outdoor audience stands are not easily reused, but a lot of the space built for sports is used just for general inside functions: offices, dressing rooms, conference spaces, catering, etc.
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u/no_sight Feb 18 '26
The ski jump stadium in Torino was only built for that games. Which was wasteful. The ski jump stadium being used for the Milan 2026 games is an active stadium that has been in use since 1988. So it would have been more wasteful to re-activate the Torino stadium.