Sylvie Paillard
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Squamish has its work cut out to be prepared for 2010, according to Casey Dorin, Capilano College Squamish Campus dean and a member of the Chamber of Commerce 2010 committee.
Dorin attended the Torino Olympics from Feb. 7 to 13 and he said Squamish would need to intensify its focus to draw in the masses of visitors anticipated.
"It was a fascinating, hugely exhilarating experience," said Dorin. "Even now as I try to define it I'm sort of having a hard time. It's magical or electric. I know that's stretching it a little bit, but you really do, you really get swept up in it."
The challenge for Squamish will be to draw people to this area when the Olympic core centres act as such a magnet.
"It's sort of all focused around the medal plaza, then the Olympic superstore and the sponsor village and the Jumbotron," he said. "All of those are huge draws for people so what I was seeing was people going out to the events and coming right back. I think we really have to look at that because people may just go up to Whistler, especially if they're just hopping on busses it's going to be really hard to drag them in off the road."
Dorin handed out 30 information packages to international sports federations on Squamish's recreation facilities and background on the community, along with invitations to talk to the Sustainability Corp about training or staying here, but all he can do is hope the packages generated interest.
Dorin sees tremendous opportunity for Squamish in the torch relay, which he said truly launched the excitement of the games."I could just feel the pride of the Italian people," he said.
Dorin said he learned about the potential challenges of the Games when he had to cancel a planned visit to Susa, a small town of similar population to Squamish near Torino, because transportation, logistics and language issues made it impossible.
"I was thinking if I was from Italy coming to Vancouver and staying downtown, first of all trying to get the message that Squamish was putting on something, I would have to get the information, then try and get there around the transportation issue. We need to spend time thinking about that."
The arts and cultural side of the games could be an exceptional leverage for the community, he said, especially with the involvement of Wild at Art. But one thing Dorin is sure of is that Squamish needs to define what it wants to portray.
"I think what's really important is knowing the story we want to tell and maximizing telling that story, because it's a great story, but I think we need to focus," he said. "If I had one thing coming away from it, is that we really need to understand the Olympics and it's a corporate event and a very well-oiled machine, very specific and we can take the glow off that."
