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Two years ago we hosted the world

69 comments

JG 09/27/2017 at 12:10 PM

Wow, it’s already been two years? Feels like a few months ago.

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Scott Tilghman 09/27/2017 at 1:25 PM

…and it was GREAT!

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Brantley Tyndall 09/27/2017 at 5:04 PM

People are still talking about it around the world, too, made possible because Peter Sagan has now won three World Championships in a row (no other rider has ever done that). We hosted the beginning of this chapter in his illustrious career.

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Ted Smith 09/27/2017 at 5:02 PM

My Instagram shots from 2015 of him and his now wife in the finish chute are getting tons of activity (relatively, let’s be clear) this week from people around the world.

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Joel Cabot 09/27/2017 at 7:07 PM

Great race

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Rachel Woolwine Davis 09/27/2017 at 9:47 PM

Amazing!

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Lora Toothman 09/27/2017 at 9:59 PM

That was such a fantastic week.

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Tim Parker 09/28/2017 at 6:49 AM

Lets do it again!

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Kathi Sanders 09/28/2017 at 8:38 AM

The best time ever!!

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Liz 09/28/2017 at 8:56 AM

Such a fun two weeks!!!

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SueWho 09/28/2017 at 9:00 AM

It was a spectacular event. I hope we can have another world class cycling event in the near future, too.

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Chris Harnish 09/28/2017 at 10:21 AM

And as expected the organizers never brought another event back.

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BAF 09/29/2017 at 3:05 PM

The best thing that happened was that the roads were repaved. But City government, strapped as it is, lost money on the race from what I have been told. The cost of things like police overtime outweighed the additional tax revenue generated, especially since City hotel tax receipts came in nowhere near what was projected by the organizers.

Most people remember the highlight weekend, but many downtown streets were closed off for weeks, and many local businesses got financially hammered by reduced weekday foot traffic. I work in the heart of Downtown and on weekdays during the races it was a ghost town. I thought the guy who owned Padow’s was going to cry on one day that I saw him at Noon with a completely empty restaurant. Downtown offices emptied out and many people worked from home, making the problem worse.

People who came out on the weekends had fun–I know I did–but the cost to the city and local businesses was high. The lost money is especially galling due to the city’s many pressing cash needs. It goes on the pile with the Redskins Training Camp and other “economic development” boondoggles that the City engages in, promising how the costs will be outweighed by big financial gains, and then taxpayers are left holding the bag.

Enough with the City trying to distract us with bread and circus. Not another taxpayer dime until the books are in order, the schools are not decrepit rat holes, the pot holes are patched and the murder rate drops.

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