What has happened to the Olympic venues from the 2004 Athens Olympics is the nightmare scenario for Sochi.
Unlike the 1984 Sarajevo Olympic venues, which were destroyed during the Bosnian War, there was no catastrophic event that led to the abandonment of the Athens arenas.
Greece simply has no use for world-class, expensive-to-maintain venues for niche sports like softball, beach volleyball, or even swimming.
They became useless immediately after the Olympics left town.
As a result, a decade after Greece spent ~$15 billion to stage the games, some of these once-gleaming venues are crumbling.
The softball stadium. A ruined fountain in the Olympic Village. The Olympic beach volleyball arena. See the rest of the story at Business Insider