The impact of events and mega-events in the city and the university

From the recent In Memoriam remembrance of 1914-1918, to WorldPride or the Transit of Venus, the University of Toronto plays a key role in creating, organizing and hosting events that draw participants from across the city and around the globe.

But what about mega-events?

Toronto is preparing to host the 2015 Pan Am/Parapan Am Games and, although not on the same scale of such mega-events as the World Cup or the Olympics, the Games are already changing the University of Toronto’s Scarborough and St. George campuses. The University's new Goldring Centre and Toronto Pan Am Sports Centre have been specially built to accommodate the games.

Former social worker and U of T urban studies lecturer David Roberts has researched the effect of mega-events on host cities and spent almost a year in Durban, South Africa, researching how that city used the 2010 World Cup to market itself. Writer Dominic Ali caught up with Roberts to get his thoughts on how the upcoming games may affect Toronto.

U of T plays a key role in organizing and hosting some of Toronto’s most important events. How important are such events to a city? And how does the University’s experience prepare it for a mega event?

What are some of the risks in betting that mega-events will revitalize cities?

There are several risks that cities face. Often, initial cost estimates are much less than the final figures. Additionally, potential economic impacts are often overstated. There is also significant risk that the new infrastructure will become a white elephant - something that has no real use after the event and is quite costly to maintain or repurpose.

Beyond that, I believe the biggest risk is one of priorities. A focus on mega-events or other tourist-oriented projects can lead to a set of investment priorities that are designed to attract and cater an external group of tourists rather than the needs of the city’s residents. Social justice concerns are often ignored in the process.

Finally, the costs of these events – especially with regards to the cost of security – have increased dramatically over the last decade.

Are there any examples of cities that have successfully transformed themselves because of a mega-event?

An example that is often cited as a success story is the 2002 Commonwealth Games in Manchester. The games are linked to a rebranding of the city into a premier sporting and tourism destination. For the Olympics, Barcelona and Sydney are often looked to as success stories. The German World Cup is often highlighted as well.

What’s the most important thing host cities should consider when planning mega-events?

For me, the biggest challenges that a host city or country faces is how to link the hosting of a mega-event to needs that extend beyond the specific requirements of hosting the event. Hosting a mega-event should complement urban investment priorities that would exist absent the event. In my opinion, this requires an open and democratic planning process that includes plenty of meaningful ways for the public to contribute.

The protests that we saw in Rio, and elsewhere in Brazil, [during the 2014 World Cup] are a symptom of a public feeling shut out of the process, a public belief that the money spent on hosting and event-related security could have been much better spent on other needs, and that the policing measures implemented were much more about making tourists feel safe than addressing the needs of the citizenry. These are legitimate reasons to protest a mega-event.

Dominic Ali writes about cities for U of T News.