Plans to create a ‘Fan Zone’ in Derry city centre during the upcoming Olympic Games in Brazil have been abandoned after the company behind the proposal pulled out of the arrangement.
It emerged in April that Derry City and Strabane District Council had been approached by ‘b-focused Ltd’ to participate in the FanZone Network during the Games taking place from August 5 – 21.
In becoming an official ‘Host City’, the council area would be designated as an ‘Official Fan Site of Team GB Rio 2016 FanZone Network’.
When the plans were first revealed, council said that it was important that any coverage on the large screen at Waterloo Place would also reflect the participation of Team Ireland.
As part of the arrangement, b-focused had asked council that ‘no other commercial partners present at the site or on screen during the pre-agreed FanZone duration’.
Council had estimated the total cost of hosting the 16 day event as £12,000.
However, the plans to host the Fan Zone have now been scrapped.
A meeting of the council’s Business and Culture Committee of the move was told officials had gone back to b-focused to ensure that coverage would be provided for both Team GB and Team Ireland.
A report brought before the meeting stated that b-focused said that they were no longer able to host the Team GB Fanzone ‘for a number of factors’.
The company said they were due to the existing commercial content being played out on the screen and that it cannot commit to the council’s request for the screen to be ‘commercially clean’ during the screening of the Olympic Games.
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