Olympia is gone, ITA/WTC is coming

The 2010 Winter Olympics have come and gone providing worldwide media exposure to the City of Vancouver. Approx. 15,000 journalists have been accredited to cover the 2010 Olympic games, almost twice as many which were accredited for past games. This extensive exposure to Vancouver will provide insight and interest to the potential delegates of ITA/WTC. The recently commissioned Canada Line has experienced higher than expected ridership by not only the Olympic traffic, but by Vancouverites as well. The planning and construction of the Canada Line will be a topic of a keynote lecture which will be presented by Jeff Hewitt of AECOM on the first day.

The venue for the WTC 2010 will be the Vancouver Conven-tion Centre, which has been praised by the international media who have used the centre as its base during the Olympics. And the delegates are able to meet in this special place.

The latest number of exhibition booths have increased from 80 to 99 in the early march. All exhibition space has been sold out since January demonstrating interest in the WTC 2010. There are more sponsors showing interest and a desire to contribute. Without support from these sponsors for this event, it would not be possible to host a conference like the coming ITA/WTC.

Tunnel Association of Cana-da in partnership with ITA-CET Foundation is holding a two day accredited Tunnelling Training Course. This will be the first time a course specifically dealing with tunnelling technology is being offered in Canada. Experts from around the world will be lecturing on the latest technology and designs.

Registration numbers are encouraging. This is the first time the WTC is being held in North America since 1996, as a result the organizers are expecting a very balanced attendance from North America, Europe, and Asia.

The WTC 2010 Executive Committee, consisting of Erik Eberhart, Laurier Forget, Rick Staples, Bill Steller, Garry Stevenson, Olivier Vion and Rick Lovat and in partnership with the National Research Council of Canada (NRC), continue to meet on a regular basis fine tuning the program and logistics. They are ready to welcome the world.

For further information concerning the venue, the special courses or trainings, the technical programme, the accommodation or the social programme just click on www.wtc2010.org