It’s safe to say that Boston is the greatest sports town in America. With all-star teams and arguably the most dedicated fan base, Boston itself seems to revolve around sports, but that does not mean it should be home to the Olympics. Of course it would bring Boston a great deal of money and attention, but should we really be focusing on that when the town itself already has so many problems?

The MBTA (or the “T” to Bostonians) has been practically crippled by a few weeks of intense snow in the Northeast region. That doesn’t bode well for the potential hordes of commuters the olympics will inevitably draw.

Its very apparent that we should have upgraded the system years ago, but that clearly did not happen. Our fellow students at UMass know this all too well. If the city upgrades the T for the Olympics, what is that saying about how it feels about its people?  Are we not important enough for the city to upgrade its transportation system for? Do we have to wait for special events like the olympics before that becomes possible?

Regardless of whether the system gets upgraded or not there are bound to be severe delays and issues caused by the sheer number of people riding it.

That temporary increase in population would lead to another massive problem with commuting: street traffic. Although the Boston Olympic committee swears that traffic will not be a problem, everyone that lives in Boston would disagree. There is always some stupid driver who will cause an accident and back up traffic for three hours, there always is. The issue isn’t with how the city is laid out; it’s with the crazy people living in it. Boston, right behind Worcester, is rated the worst city to drive in. How are people from all around the world going to learn to adapt to this? The answer is that they’re not. People who have lived in Boston their whole life haven’t even adapted to this.

Also, where are they going to put all these people? UMass has mentioned that they wish to turn Harbor Point into the Olympic Village, but seems to have forgotten the hundreds of people that live there that don’t go to UMass. So what happens if they do make it the Olympic Village, where do the people who live there go? Not to mention that Boston is a relatively small town (size wise), so the massive influx of people is going to force the neighboring towns to take on the burden of housing visitors and tourists, which probably will not go well.

Another pertinent issue to consider is the venues for the events. No one is going to want to travel to Foxboro to watch a soccer match. People can barely get there to watch a Pats game without being stuck in three hours of traffic, let alone an entire Olympic event. Boston, as mentioned before, is very small and compact. Creating new venues will be pretty difficult without damaging some of the places Boston is known and loved for.

It is seriously not worth having the Olympics here when other cities are much better suited for it. Plus, we have the Pats, Bruins, Sox, and Celtics to cheer on anyways.