Sport: Eve of a New Olympics

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Cheerfully, he mentions another danger. Regarding Los Angeles' large Jewish community, he says, "Already they threaten to smother us with love. I've received dozens of invitations for the team to attend dinners, receptions, meetings. It's going to be a problem keeping our athletes in shape and concentrating on the Games with the kind of attention they're giving us." Another happy report of this sort is issued by Carl-Olaf Homen, a Finnish official: "One thing the L.A. Games has going for it is the great hospitality of the Americans. Last January, every single person in the visiting national Olympic committees was invited to dinner in a private home, and there were hundreds of people."

Something akin to this constitutes Ueberroth's ideal security, his best hope for a serene summer. He has noticed how proprietary New York City has become about its marathon and Fifth Avenue Mile, literally rejoicing in the street. "The people have embraced these events," says Ueberroth. "Spectators line up ten deep to cheer. And there's no trouble. It's like everyone in the city is saying, 'This is neat. Don't mess with it.' When a city decides that about anything, trouble tends to go south."

Referring to Los Angeles as one city is something of an oversimplification, as the most distant Olympic venues symbolize. The 23 sites describe an area of 4,500 sq. mi., ranging 84 miles north of downtown Los Angeles to Lake Casitas in Ventura County (canoeing and rowing) and 110 miles south to the Fairbanks Ranch in northern San Diego County (the endurance phase of the equestrian competition). Searching for a shooting site in what must be a wealth of sagebrush sounds uncomplicated. But Ueberroth almost ended up in Las Vegas. "We go out into a rural canyon somewhere," he says, "and all of a sudden there is someone living six miles down the road. Then the Sierra Club comes in and files suit because it affects the flight of the witchy-witchy bird. Not that I disagree. It's just what happens."

Without benefit of mass transit, anywhere from 400,000 to 600,000 daily visitors will expand the city's population to 3.6 million. California State Senator Alan Robbins says darkly, "The Games have all the potential of turning Los Angeles into the largest parking lot in the U.S." U.S.C. Futurist Selwyn Enzer foresees "a freeway system so clogged that motorists will think they are in a new Olympic event: demolition derby." And Police Commander William Rathburn says, "We can't rule out gridlock." But traffic planners stand by preparedly if still a bit anxiously with closed-circuit TV monitors, wire sensors in highway beds and a comprehensive game plan. Four hundred civilian traffic-control officers will join ranks with 450 traffic policemen. Buses will ferry spectators from near and distant car parks to the various sites.