Will the 2024 Olympic Games be held partly in Indre? While the possibility has been mentioned since the beginning of the year, this is in any case what several hundred elected officials, business leaders and sports associations in the Center-Val-de-Loire Region are asking for this Tuesday in a gallery this Tuesday. They request that the sports shooting events be held at the Center National de Châteauroux-Déolsthe largest in Europe.
A Center already ready to host international competitions
They are nearly 600, on the initiative of Gil Avérous, the mayor of Châteauroux Métropole, and the president of the Department of Indre, Marc Fleuret to campaign for the Organizing Committee to change its tune, a “option more and more considered” according to the text.
Do you have the impression that this site can perfectly host the Olympic Games? You are right ! – excerpt from the forum
In this forum, the signatories explain that the CNTS, with an area of 80 hectares, already hosts the world championships in the discipline. The site cost 30 million euros including 5 million euros of public money, in order to equip it completely, including for television broadcasting live tests.
They also recall the will of the National Sports Shooting Federation during its presentation brochure of the CNTS: “This Center must also be intended to become an Olympic site, in the event that France, a candidate, is chosen for the 2024 Olympics”. Other arguments put forward: the proximity of Châteauroux and Paris by train (1h50) and the holding of events already planned in other cities outside Île-de-France (Bordeaux, Lille, Lyon, Marseille, Nantes, Nice, Saint-Étienne and Tahiti).
The Courneuve site, too expensive to develop?
For the moment, officially, it is still the site of La Courneuve which is privileged to host these events. But, unlike the CNTS of Châteauroux-Déols, it is far from being ready: present in a “Natura 2000” area, it must be cleaned up, which will cost, according to the signatories, a overrun of 40 million euros on the initial budget “due to soil pollution much higher than what was imagined”. Furthermore, this site would be destroyed after the Olympicswhich would cost another 13 million euros.
“Let’s dare to use common sense”conclude the signatories, who finally commit to “To fully support the Organizing Committee of the Olympic Games in the realization of this magnificent project”.