Lake Placid 1980: Taking the Adirondacks global, again
Lake Placid’s second Olympic Winter Games, staged 48 years after its first, cemented its status as one of the USA’s major winter sports capitals.
Tucked away in New York state’s picturesque Adirondack Mountains and home to just over 2,000 people, Lake Placid is a popular tourist destination and has benefited from the profile provided by staging the Olympic Winter Games. Visitors are attracted by the village’s Olympic heritage, its thriving arts and cultural scene, and a wide range of programmes and activities.
Lake Placid is mindful of its natural surroundings, however, and reminds incomers to be respectful of the environment, a key factor in the area’s sustainable growth. Playing their part in the ongoing Lake Placid success story are a well-organised and motivated community of volunteers, who staff the village’s venues and museums and help run local events. They are the living face of the pride that Lake Placid takes in being a two-time Olympic host city.
The venues that hosted the XIII Olympic Winter Games – some of them existing from 1932 and some built specially for 1980 – all remain in use today and continue to make a valuable contribution to the local economy. Under the stewardship of the New York Olympic Regional Development Authority (ORDA), which was founded after the 1980 Olympic Winter Games to manage and promote them, these venues provide high-quality training and competition facilities for elite athletes and also serve large numbers of recreational winter sports enthusiasts.
Driving the local economy
Lake Placid’s sports facilities, which also include the non-Olympic sites of Gore Mountain and Belleayre Mountain, attracted 1.5 million visits in 2018/19 and generated a total of USD 156 million in visitor spending. The village also hosts major sporting events such as the FIL Luge World Cup, the FIS Freestyle World Cup, the Empire State Games and the IBSF Para Bobsleigh World Championships, and will stage the 2023 Winter World University Games.
In promoting tourism in the region, ORDA partners with hundreds of businesses across the state and supports numerous initiatives. In the process, it helps to attract guests to hotels and motels, skiers and snowboarders to resorts, and fans to sporting events. ORDA makes a significant contribution to the local economy and employs as many as 1,500 full- and part-time staff in peak season.
Its efforts to attract visitors to Lake Placid are complemented by those of the Regional Office of Sustainable Tourism (ROOST), which markets the village and the rest of the
Adirondacks as a destination for tourists and new residents alike. In seeking to boost economic growth through tourism, ROOST develops strategies that promote the wide range of cultural, leisure and conference events and activities that the Lake Placid region offers all year round. ROOST aims to make this happen sustainably, working to reduce the environmental impact of the ongoing growth in hiker numbers and holiday rentals.
A major sporting hub
Lake Placid’s Olympic venues remain popular with elite and recreational athletes to this day and continue to benefit the region. Local residents and visitors make extensive use of the region’s Olympic facilities and ski trails. By way of example, more than 17,000 people skated at the Olympic Speed Skating Oval across the 2018/19 season, and over 40,000 ski lessons were given at the Whiteface, Gore and Belleayre ski resorts.
Meanwhile, more than 5,000 athletes from 30 countries trained and competed at Lake Placid’s world-renowned Olympic venues in 2018/19. The construction of the US Olympic and Paralympic Training Center in 1989 brought another top-class facility to the village. The Center offers full-time training and sports science services to the country’s elite athletes, helping them hone their skills, improve their results and achieve success. It is also used by the local community.
Together, these venues have hosted more than 470 major national and international events and competitions since Lake Placid 1980, including 15 world championships and more than 110 World Cup rounds in Alpine skiing and other winter sports disciplines. Lake Placid was also the venue for the 2019 International Children’s Winter Games.
A proud Olympic community
The volunteer programme rolled out for the Olympic Winter Games Lake Placid 1980, which involved the recruitment, training and management of 6,700 people, provided a model for subsequent host cities to follow. The region’s community of volunteers remains very active today, playing a prominent role in Lake Placid’s continuing ability to attract and organise major events such as World Cup luge and freestyle skiing competitions.
Volunteers also assist with the regular anniversary celebrations held to commemorate the staging of the XIII Olympic Winter Games in 1980. These include the annual Lake Placid Loppet, a mass-participation cross-country skiing race held at the Mount Van Hoevenberg Olympic Sports Complex. Volunteers were an integral part of the 40th anniversary events in early 2020, joining athletes, organisers and Olympians to reminisce and share their stories and experiences.
Also run by ORDA, the award-winning Lake Placid Olympic Museum showcases the Olympic values and Olympic history, and houses over 3,500 items, including memorabilia and photographs. One of its current displays is Miracle on Ice, which relives the USA’s shock 4-3 victory against the USSR in the men’s ice hockey tournament in 1980. A source of pride in the area, the museum is an important driver of tourism, attracting over 42,000 visitors in 2018/19.