Host Selection
The cities of Denver, Colorado, United States; Sion, Switzerland; Tampere, Finland; and Vancouver (with the Garibaldi mountains), Canada, made bids for the Games.
The games were originally awarded to Denver in May 12, 1970, but a 300 percent rise in costs and worries about environmental impact led to Colorado voters' rejection on November 7, 1972, by a 3 to 2 margin, of a $5 million bond issue to finance the games with public funds.
Denver officially withdrew on November 15, and the IOC then offered the games to Whistler, British Columbia, Canada, but they too declined owing to a change of government following elections. Whistler would go on to be associated with neighbouring Vancouver's successful bid for the 2010 games.
Salt Lake City, Utah, which would eventually host in 2002, offered itself as a potential host after the withdrawal of Denver. The IOC, still reeling from the Denver rejection, declined and selected Innsbruck, which had hosted the 1964 Winter Olympics games twelve years earlier, on February 5, 1973.
The chart below displays the original vote count for the 69th IOC meeting at Amsterdam, Netherlands, in 1970, before the Denver rejection and the installation of Innsbruck, Austria, as alternate host.
| Original 1976 Winter Olympics bidding results | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| City | Country | Round 1 | Round 2 | Round 3 | ||
| Denver | United States | 29 | 29 | 39 | ||
| Sion | Switzerland | 18 | 31 | 30 | ||
| Tampere | Finland | 12 | 8 | — | ||
| Vancouver—Garibaldi | Canada | 9 | — | — | ||
Read more about this topic: 1976 Winter Olympics
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