Casey Wasserman (left) believes that Los Angeles 2024 will have time and money to invest in the delivering an excellent athlete experience ©Getty Images

Los Angeles 2024 bid chairman Casey Wasserman has claimed that they will have both the time and money to deliver a great athlete experience should the city be awarded the Olympic and Paralympic Games.

Town hall meetings have already been held by Los Angeles 2024 in an attempt to gauge feedback from athletes and coaches on their plans for Games, with a focus on ensuring the bid is seen as “countrywide”.

Further meetings have been earmarked to take place in Chicago during May and in California, as they look to gain further ideas towards the bid, while they will also take place at the United States’ athletics, swimming and gymnastics Olympic trials for Rio 2016.

Among the key focuses of the meetings are to provide athletes with an opportunity to offer their thoughts on the current venue plans, as well as detailing how Los Angeles 2024 can improve the experience of competitors entourage, including family, during the Games.

Wasserman, who is among Los Angeles delegation attending SportAccord Convention, believes that some previous Olympic cities have been forced to focus solely on delivering venues and infrastructure on time for the Games, rather than delivering an excellent athlete experience.

With Los Angeles 2024 claiming that 97 per cent of their venues are already completed, taking in account facilities already planned by private investors or temporary structures, that they will be able to focus more on the athletes’ needs.

“Everyone who bids for an Olympic, Summer or Winter, are clearly going to say that they are committed to delivering a great athlete experience,” Wasserman said here today.

“The difference with our bid, we believe, is to deliver against that is resources - time and money.

“That time and money is not a luxury that most bids have, because they are so focused on delivery.

“If you are worried about infrastructure, building facilities and just physically getting the city ready for the Games, it is hard to spend time looking at things that aren’t focused on that.

“We believe that with the infrastructure at the facilities we have in Los Angeles that we have the ability to commit time and money to that effort.”

Casey Wasserman believes the investment in transport infrastructure could boost visitors should Los Angeles be awarded the Games ©LA2024
Casey Wasserman believes the investment in transport infrastructure could boost visitors should Los Angeles be awarded the Games ©LA2024

Wasserman also claimed that the city could benefit from working with major companies based in California, such as Google, describing the state’s technological industry as being “unprecedented in the world.”

In the event the city were awarded the Games, Los Angeles 2024 believe visitors will able to make use of an $88 billion (£61.4 billion/€79 billion) transport upgrade in city, which the city are already investing in and is separate from the bid.

It is claimed that the transportation network will be the most extensive in the United States, with the majority of the improvements expected to be ready in 2023.

“That’s metro, carpool lanes, bus transit systems and the airport, it is a massive infrastructure investment," said Wasserman.

“Everywhere you go in LA there is evidence of it and a great portion of that will be done by 2023.”