Should Montreal host the Olympics again? Debate returns 50 years after 1976 Games

Fifty years after the Olympic Games put Montreal on the world stage, a debate has returned on whether the city could or should try to bring back the Games. With the Olympic Stadium still undergoing renovations and the price tag for hosting now reaching into the billions, critics point to the city’s own history. The [...] The post Should Montreal host the Olympics again? Debate returns 50 years after 1976 Games appeared first on CityNews Montreal .

Should Montreal host the Olympics again? Debate returns 50 years after 1976 Games Posted July 15, 2026 7:12 am. Last Updated July 15, 2026 7:15 am.

Fifty years after the Olympic Games put Montreal on the world stage, a debate has returned on whether the city could or should try to bring back the Games. With the Olympic Stadium still undergoing renovations and the price tag for hosting now reaching into the billions, critics point to the city’s own history. The 1976 Games ballooned from a projected $120 million to roughly $1.5 billion and took 30 years to pay off.

Howard Stupp, who represented Team Canada’s wrestling team in the ’76 Games, says the city should give it another go if it has the venues. “I think that if it would not be overly expensive to host the Games,” Stupp said. “In other words, if there’s sufficient venues that are already built or if not that many new venues would have to be rebuilt or renovated, then why not?

But it’s a huge exercise for 16 days of competition.” A Concordia economist says cities hardly see a return on their investment when they host big sporting events like the Olympics or the FIFA World Cup. “We should never host the Olympics in Montreal again.

It’s never going to deliver the required benefits,” said Moshe Lander, a senior lecturer of economics at Concordia University. “The cost will always come in over. “We don’t need a track and field stadium that’s only going to be used for this one event and then for nothing else.”

Montrealers who spoke to CityNews were divided on the question of whether the city should play hosts again. “I think we should,” Stanley Kircoff said. “Fix that Olympic Stadium, tear it down or build or do something with it.”

“Yeah, why not?” added Denis and Linda. “It’ll attract tourists. Tourists come to spend money, and that keeps the economy going.”

However, Svens Telemaque was skeptical about the economic benefits. “It’ll be too costly and from what we saw on the news, it really wasn’t beneficial for Montreal.” Telemaque said.

“It caused much more restrictions and there was nothing really to gain.” The debate goes beyond the cost of hosting, however. Lander says mega sporting events often face the same challenges: rising costs, construction delays and budgets that rarely hold.

“Every host makes the same mistake over and over thinking, ‘here’s the budget that we can stick to,’” Lander said. “Your budget is irrelevant the day you publish it because the IOC or FIFA are going to say, we could care less which numbers you’re saying, you’re ours.” Another key issue is whether Montreal’s existing infrastructure could support the demands of a modern Olympic Games.

“The infrastructure that we have is woefully inadequate to host a 21st century Olympics with 20th century infrastructure,” Lander added. But McGill University civil engineering professor Daniele Malomo says many of the city’s existing facilities could be adapted and reused, making another Olympic bid a realistic possibility. “Infrastructure is a number of different systems, right?

We have bridges, we have streets, we have energy grids and so on and so forth,” Malomo said. “So I’m thinking Paris and thinking older cities that did host the Olympics recently. And certainly, there’s the possibility.

Why not?”