The postponed Tokyo Olympics will be held at the same venues and under the same schedule as planned before the games were delayed due to the coronavirus pandemic, the Tokyo Games organizing committee said Friday.
The additional cost from the year-long delay will be reported as early as this autumn, organizing committee CEO Toshiro Muto told a press conference. He also said organizers will look to set up a three-party team with the national and Tokyo metropolitan governments to work on COVID-19 countermeasures.
The Olympic opening ceremony is scheduled to start at 8 p.m. on July 23 next year, in keeping with a plan to officially begin the games on the fourth Friday of the month.
The Tokyo Olympics were originally slated to be held this year between July 24 and Aug. 9 before the outbreak of the novel coronavirus resulted in the unprecedented one-year postponement.
The softball tournament will start two days before the opening ceremony, also as originally planned, in Fukushima Prefecture, northeastern Japan.
Tokyo Games organizing committee President Yoshiro Mori reported the plan to use the same venues and schedule next summer in a video presentation to the International Olympic Committee session on Friday, which marked exactly a week until the games were originally slated to open.
"We shall not be caught up by precedent and will make these games totally different from those in the past, ones that are safe, secure and simplified," Mori said.
Speaking after the IOC session, IOC President Thomas Bach declined to go into specifics about what scenarios are being considered to ensure the safety of next year's Olympics.
"You cannot address the details yet," he said. "In many countries, you don't know the requirements you have tomorrow, whether you can leave your house...You don't know about tomorrow. So how can you know in details about the most complex event to organize in the world to organize?"
He said, however, that reducing spectators was a possibility.
"This is one of the scenarios we have to look into," Bach said. "This has to do with travel restrictions and quarantines. It's too early to tell."
"It's not what we want. We would like to see stadia full of enthusiastic fans," he added.
When asked if the opening and closing ceremonies might be subject to cost cutting, Bach said those decisions were in the hands of the organizers but expressed his opinion that they should be unforgettable experiences.
Only some slight adjustments were made to the schedule in order to fine-tune the timing and order of events.
The XXXII Olympiad will feature 339 events, the most in modern Olympic history, and will end with the closing ceremony on Aug. 8.
Swimming preliminaries will kick off on July 24, with the first medal events taking place the day after at Tokyo Aquatics Centre.
Medal events of some of the most popular Olympic events will take place in August. The final of the men's 100-meter sprint, won by Jamaica's Usain Bolt at the past three editions of the games, will be held on Aug. 1.
As is traditional, the men's marathon will be held on the final day, while the women's race is slated for Aug. 7.
With the framework of the tournament in place, organizers are now working to simplify the games in order to reduce costs and implement measures to prevent infection of the pneumonia-causing coronavirus.
The organizing committee announced earlier it will provide ticket refunds to those unable to attend the games due to the postponement, though details have yet to be decided.
It was also announced that medals for the men's and women's marathon will be presented at the closing ceremony at the new National Stadium in Tokyo. The road races were relocated to the northern city of Sapporo to avoid the intense heat and humidity of Tokyo's late summer.
The Olympics were postponed for the first time in history in March amid rising concerns of holding the games during the global health crisis.
Earlier this year, organizers began negotiations with facility owners with the aim of ensuring the same venues and competition schedule. All venues, including the athletes village, are expected to be available for use next summer.
Organizers are still negotiating with some owners, however, over specific dates and compensation in order to settle a formal contract.
