" We won't have the Olympic Games? It's not a big deal. OGC Nice will be able to play at the Allianz Riviera, at the very highest level of French football, in 2030 " it was with these words that Eric Ciotti reacted on Friday evening to the announcement that the 2030 Olympic Games would be moving to Lyon.
The far-right mayor of Nice immediately saw a political decision: "Everything points to the fact that this decision is more a political choice driven by the satisfaction of private lobbies than by technical or organizational considerations, and that it aims to punish the people of Nice for the vote they freely expressed at the ballot box " he said in a press release.
The departure of the Nice Games is nevertheless the consequence of his stubborn refusal to make the Nice stadium available for a few months as was planned from the start with the IOC and the COJOP 2030. A blockage that will cost the people of Nice and the entire Provence Alpes Côte d'Azur Region a great deal.
Amélie Oudéa-Castéra, the former sports minister, reminded everyone this weekend: it is not a political decision but the consequence of the Nice blockage: " Once the Allianz Riviera option was definitively ruled out, the COJOP's choice to take the hub out of Nice was validated by all the governance stakeholders of Alpes 2030, with regret but in a spirit of responsibility because it had become the only realistic option . "
The ice hub was the real gem of these Olympic Games: Based on Milan Cortina's figures, we could have expected between 400 and 500,000 cumulative spectators for the events in Nice. Ice hockey alone accounted for 60% of all the Games' ticketing revenue, with a clientele often Anglo-Saxon and with high purchasing power. Nice and its ice hub was the most promising cluster in terms of welcoming spectators.
In a letter sent to the mayor of Nice, the president of the Region Renaud Muselier details the economic consequences of the Olympic Games leaving. The list is long and the total amount of the shortfall for the city of Nice and even the region is approaching one billion euros, according to the Region's president.
So here are the real figures and the estimated amount of the true cost of the departure of the 2030 Olympic Games from Nice.
SOLIDEO, the organization in charge of delivering the Olympic venues, had two major projects in Nice: the creation of an Olympic village to host the athletes and a new ice rink, replacing the current aging one. Nice was also the only city to benefit from a new sports facility for these Olympic Games.
Nice was thus the only Olympic site able to benefit from such a legacy after the Games: a brand-new ice rink, and an Olympic village turned into 400 housing units in a city under strong pressure in the real estate market. All of this being largely financed by the COJOP, that is, the South Region, the State, and the partners of these Games.
The organizing committee for the Olympic Games had scheduled 300 million euros in investments in Nice.
So there is no possible debate about these amounts: They are entirely lost for Nice. Beyond the lost investments, there will also be a cost for taxpayers because the calls for tenders, public contracts, and construction sites were about to start, and it will now be necessary to compensate the companies selected and that worked on the Nice file.
The Provence Alpes Côte d'Azur Region is a major funder of these Games, but the city, the metropolitan area, and the department were also supposed to contribute to the tune of 140 million euros. If " Eric Ciotti announces that these financial resources will be redirected to everyday sports facilities ", that is, Nice clubs and facilities, part of this amount could nevertheless be lost to compensate these companies.
Beyond the companies tasked with building these venues, it is an entire regional ecosystem that is affected by abandoning the Nice project: Thousands of jobs were supposed to be filled both in organizing the events and hosting the athletes, but above all, in the tourism companies of the Côte d'Azur.
Renaud Muselier points out that " The 2023 Rugby World Cup generated about 148 million euros in economic spin-offs in Nice, for only four matches organized at the Allianz Riviera. " With these hundreds of thousands of spectators expected over two weeks, the impact on businesses linked to tourism was particularly promising for the city.
This impact was all the more interesting because the Games take place during a first quarter that is always weaker than the rest of the year. Restaurants, hotels, tour operators, downtown shops… Nice has just sabotaged a unique opportunity to strengthen its economic fabric, as was the case in Paris or Marseille in 2024.
" Lost direct tourism and event spin-offs can reasonably be estimated at between 180 and 280 million euros. " Renaud Muselier
For comparison, the spin-offs for the Olympic Games amounted to 205 million euros in Marseille in 2024, according to the independent research firm Approbans. These expenses were split in half between the spending of the 500,000 spectators and that of the organizers and teams present in Marseille.
For Nice, one could count on slightly fewer visitors but a far more massive presence of Games participants, and in particular the media center, with thousands of journalists present during the two-week period of the Games.
The range put forward by Renaud Muselier therefore seems consistent.
The arrival of the far right at the head of the city may have worried foreign tourists and some economic players. This refusal to host the Olympic Games under the conditions set by the IOC and the COJOP will considerably damage Nice's image internationally. And yet, for two years now, Nice has been giving itself an international profile by hosting the Tour de France and especially UNOC 2025.
" Nice is also losing a historic opportunity to become a global laboratory for applied innovation for major events, sport, the energy transition, and urban technologies, by drawing in particular on the unique ecosystem of Sophia Antipolis, Europe's first tech park. " explains Renaud Muselier in his letter to the mayor of Nice.
After the episode of withdrawing support for trails organized in Nice and therefore now that of the Olympic Games, it is difficult to imagine that organizers of international congresses or sporting events would still want to come to Nice.
This impact is impossible to quantify today, but it is certain that in just a few weeks of a mandate, the UDR-RN mayor of Nice has already seriously damaged the city's image among event professionals.
With a media center, hundreds of hours of TV broadcasts, and the closing ceremony, Nice had an exceptional opportunity to present itself to the whole world.
" In Milan-Cortina, the Games generated nearly 3 billion cumulative television viewers worldwide. The only closing ceremony representing an estimated worldwide audience of 600 million television viewers. " Renaud Muselier
These audience figures are factually correct, but it is always very difficult to translate them into economic value.
In his letter, Renaud Muselier estimates the value of this exposure at between 100 and 200 million euros in media value equivalent, that is, the equivalent of what it would have been necessary to spend in Nice to buy advertising inserts.
This figure is therefore subject to debate, because you cannot really compare a closing ceremony on the Promenade des Anglais broadcast worldwide with pages or advertising spots purchased in international media. In other words, such exposure has no price, so rare and value-adding it is for the destination.
One thing is certain: Enormous numbers of cities want to host the Olympic Games because it is a fantastic accelerator for their tourist image internationally. With already strong hotel infrastructure and an international airport, this tourist impact would have been easier to measure afterwards.
The organization of the Olympic Games also allows territories to accelerate or create new structuring facilities. In Nice, some projects were " accelerated " thanks to the Olympic Games. That is to say, they were supposed to happen in any case, but the arrival of the Games made it possible to give them an acceleration, with the need to have them delivered before 2030.
With the cancellation of the Games, the pressure eases on the projects underway because there is no longer the imperative need to deliver on time. Renaud Muselier gives the example of the Nice Airport Station and its 271 million euros in investment. " The withdrawal of the ice events will automatically reduce the pressure on the delivery schedule, creating a real risk for this deadline, with harmful consequences for the attractiveness of the territory, airport access, tourism and everyday mobility. "
A priori, there will be no cancellation of projects for Nice and its metropolitan area, especially since the work and funding are already underway, but rather delays and new projects that will wait.
So it is very complex to quantify the real cost of these postponements, but it is certain that it will genuinely affect the daily lives of the people of Nice.
The real figure for the loss of the Olympic Games for Nice: at least 600 million euros, but probably much more. Ultimately, it will be by 2030 that we will be able to see whether the city led by the far right manages, despite everything, to recreate an equivalent tourist dynamic.
The bad-mouthers will say that for the 2029-2030 season, OGC Nice will therefore have one of the biggest budgets in Ligue 1. A season that will therefore indirectly cost the people of Nice at least more than 600 million euros.
So you'll have to enjoy this season, because with about 500,000 cumulative spectators over the season, each ticket sold will represent the equivalent of 1,200€ in lost revenue for the city!
