[joshdance]

>Similarly, Salt Lake City was hardly a city before 2002...

What? Salt Lake City hardly changed with the Olympics. The ski resorts were already there, the hockey arena was already there, the Olympic stadium was already there. The main things that was added were some cool signage, a few Olympic monuments and some roadway improvements which were already in progress. One of the biggest things built, the Olympic Park - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Utah_Olympic_Park, isn't even in Salt Lake, it is in Park City.

Attributing Salt Lake City becoming what it is today because of the Olympics is causation/correlation. Maybe the Olympics came to Salt Lake because of what it was?