To make its Games a success, the host country must meet several criteria: obtain good sporting results, demonstrate as impeccable an organization as possible, generate popular enthusiasm and, lastly, succeed in the post-Games. With 64 medals at the Olympic Games (OG) and 75 medals at the Paralympic Games, the French athletes have fulfilled the sporting objective that had been set for them at the beginning of the summer. In terms of organization, the competitions took place without any major hitches in terms of security – at the cost of an impressive police presence – or transport, two of the main fears that had been raised for months.
It has never seemed so pleasant to take the metro in Paris, whose frequency of trains, during the Olympic Games, had been increased by the RATP and in which 5,000 specially recruited agents directed users, with smiles on their faces. The organization of the Games was hailed by the international press, dazzled, among other things, by the brilliance of the fencing competitions at the Grand Palais, the horse riding at the Palace of Versailles or the blind football at the foot of the Eiffel Tower.
Another success is popular enthusiasm. The fervor that swept the Olympics on the evening of the opening ceremony on July 26 restored, at least for a fortnight, a form of national pride to a divided country. From the La Défense Arena pool in Nanterre to the Châteauroux shooting range, via the warm evenings of the Club France at the Grande Halle de la Villette in Paris, the French people thrilled in unison to the French sporting exploits.
And the soufflé did not fall during the Paralympic Games, during which many competition sites were sold out. Never before have so many tickets been sold during the Olympic Games (9.5 million out of the 10 million on sale) and the “paras” (more than 2.5 million tickets were sold or allocated), except London 2012 (2.7 million for the Paralympics).
What future access to sport?
However, success will only be complete if the post-Games period is successful, what organizers and public authorities call “legacy,” both tangible and intangible. The first, visible, can easily be appreciated. Dozens of sports facilities were built or renovated during the Paris Olympics, including many swimming pools – such as the Olympic Aquatic Center – in Seine-Saint-Denis, a department where they are sorely lacking. But the lack of sports infrastructure remains a reality throughout the territory.
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