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The International Olympic Committee has picked five cities as finalists to host the 2024 Summer Olympic Games. The announcement was made on Wednesday and the selected cities included Los Angeles, Paris, Rome, Budapest and Hamburg, BBC reports.
Toronto, on the other hand, decided against a last-minute bid and mayor John Tory announced on Monday that the city has cited other important priorities instead. The International Olympic Committee will select the host city at a vote in Lima, Peru in September 2017.
The IOC changed the rules in August in order to ensure the progression of the cities that have bid to reach to the final vote for the 2024 Olympics. The organization selected a shortlist of candidates, who would then progress to a vote by the 100 IOC members.
The rule was changed after four cities Stockholm, Lviv, Krakow and Oslo withdrew for consideration of bidding for the 2022 Winter Olympics instead. China’s Beijing narrowly beat the only remaining challenger – Kazakhstan’ s Almaty in the final vote of IOC delegates.
Winter Olympics bid in 2026 being considered, Calgary mayor confirms
Toronto's decision not to bid for the 2024 Summer Olympics seems to have given Calgary's plans for a future Winter Games a boost.
Toronto’s decision to withdraw bid for 2024 Olympics
Mayor John Tory has confirmed that a local group has been working on a bid for the 2026 Winter Games despite withdrawing their bid for 2024 Summer Olympics, as per the reports on CBC.
"Maybe 2026 will be our moment. Maybe not," he said.
"As I say to many people … interesting idea, let's flesh it out."
It is also believed that a group of community leaders has been talking about possibly making a Calgary Olympic bid.
"It's certainly a conversation that I'm open to having with folks with the federal and provincial governments but more important, with people in the community," said Calgary Mayor Naheed Nenshi.
"There are some folks who have suggested that an arena proposal that came out this summer was a stalking horse for an Olympic bid. That is not in any way true,"
