Waterlogged Allotments at Marsh Lane Fields. Feb 2008 © Martin Slavin

American landscape architects are promising east Londoners a park that will be "equivalent to Hyde Park" and "will give the area an equal weight to the west" (Olympics will leave east London an open space to rival Hyde Park, March 17). However, there are fundamental questions about the way the park and its surrounding developments are being planned that your article fails to address.

With a brash young lawyer-lawmaker named Dick Lamm leading the way, residents said they didn't want the 1976 Winter Olympics. And they said it in a big way. The landmark vote on Nov. 7, 1972, wasn't even close -- 514,228 to 350,964. A 59.4 percent majority said they weren't willing to spend tax dollars to have the Games in their state.

Chicago's 2016 bid committee hopes the 80 pages of information it sent last week to the International Olympic Committee will help distinguish the quality of the city's Summer Olympic bid from those of its six rivals. After all, the IOC will pick finalist cities in June largely on the basis of that information.

Although the Commonwealth Games are just under three years away, India's capital is being reshaped as the city prepares for the biggest sporting event in its history. The Delhi government has begun putting up posters saying the capital will be transformed into a "world-class city" by the 2010 deadline.

NEW council tax rises may be needed to fund the 2012 Olympics and its aftermath, it has emerged. A leaked report and parliamentary answers suggest that not only will households in London be affected, but also taxpayers in the surrounding counties, including Essex and Hertfordshire.

Martin Slavin writes: A consistent pattern of behaviour exhibited by ODA/LDA personnel we have encountered has become apparent to all of us who have been actively involved in the critical appraisal and/or opposition to the Olympic development. It is their chaotic project management.