In Ancient Greek, the name of Athens was: Ἀθῆναι , related tο the name of the goddess Athena (Attic Ἀθηνᾶ and Ionic Ἀθήνη ). In Homeric Greek the city's name was in the singular form (Ἀθήνη) then changed in the plural, like those of Θῆβαι (Thēbai), Μυκῆναι (Mukēnai), and Δελφοί (Delphoi).
An etiological myth explaining how Athens acquired this name was well known amongst ancient Athenians and even became the theme of the sculpture on the West pediment of the Parthenon. Both Athena and Poseidon requested to be patrons of the city and to give their name to it, so they competed with one another for the honor, offering the city one gift each. Poseidon produced a salt water spring by striking the ground with his trident, symbolizing naval power. Athena created the olive tree, symbolizing peace and prosperity. The Athenians, under their ruler Cecrops, accepted the olive tree and named the city after Athena.
Since the official abandonment of Katharevousa Greek in the 1970s, the demotic Αθήνα (Athína / ) has become the city's official name in place of Ἀθῆναι.
The oldest known human presence in Athens is the Cave of Schist which has been dated to between the 11th and 7th millennium BC. Athens has been continuously inhabited for at least 7000 years. By 1400 BC the settlement had become an important centre of the Mycenaean civilization and the Acropolis was the site of a major Mycenaean fortress whose remains can be recognised from sections of the characteristic Cyclopean walls. Unlike other Mycenaean centers, such as Mycenae and Pylos, it is not known whether Athens suffered destruction in about 1200 BC, an event often attributed to a Dorian invasion, and the Athenians always maintained that they were "pure" Ionians with no Dorian element. However, Athens, like many other Bronze Age settlements, went into economic decline for around 150 years following this.
Iron Age burials, in the Kerameikos and other locations, are often richly provided for and demonstrate that from 900 BC onwards Athens was one of the leading centers of trade and prosperity in the region. The leading position of Athens may well have resulted from its central location in the Greek world, its secure stronghold on the Acropolis and its access to the sea, which gave it a natural advantage over inland rivals such as Thebes and Sparta.
By the 6th century BC, widespread social unrest led to the reforms of Solon. These would pave the way for the eventual introduction of democracy by Cleisthenes in 508 BC. Athens had by this time become a significant naval power with a large fleet, and helped the rebellion of the Ionian cities against Persian rule. In the ensuing Greco-Persian Wars Athens, together with Sparta, led the coalition of Greek states that repelled the Persians, defeating them decisively at Marathon in 490 BC and crucially at Salamis in 480 BC.
The decades that followed became known as the Golden Age of Athenian democracy, during which time Athens became the leading city of Ancient Greece, with its cultural achievements laying the foundations of Western civilization. The playwrights Aeschylus, Sophocles and Euripides all lived and worked in Athens during this time, as did the historians Herodotus and Thucydides, the physician Hippocrates, and the philosopher Socrates. Guided by Pericles, who promoted the arts and fostered democracy, Athens embarked on an ambition building program that saw the construction of the Acropolis of Athens (including the Parthenon), as well as empire-building via the Delian League. Originally intended as an association of Greek city-states to continue the fight against the Persians, the league soon turned into a vehicle for Athens' own imperial ambitions. The resulting tensions brought about the Peloponnesian War (431-404 BC), in which Athens was defeated by its rival Sparta.
By the end of Late Antiquity the city experienced decline followed by recovery in the second half of the Middle Byzantine Period (9th–10th centuries AD), and was relatively prosperous during the Crusades, benefiting from Italian trade. In 1453 it was conquered by the Ottoman Empire and entered a long period of decline.
Following the Greek War of Independence, Athens was chosen as the capital of the newly independent Greek state in 1834, largely due to historical and sentimental reasons. At the time it was a town of modest size built around the foot of the Acropolis. The first King of Greece, Otto of Bavaria, commissioned the architects Stamatios Kleanthis and Gustav Schaubert to design a modern city plan fit for the capital of a state.
The first modern city plan consisted of a triangle defined by the Acropolis, the ancient cemetery of Kerameikos and the new palace of the Bavarian king (now housing the Greek Parliament), so as to highlight the continuity between modern and ancient Athens. Neoclassicism, the international style of this epoch, was the architectural style through which Bavarian, French and Greek architects such as Hansen, Klenze, Boulanger or Kaftantzoglou designed the first important public buildings of the new capital. In 1896 Athens hosted the first modern Olympic Games. During the 1920s a number of Greek refugees, expelled from Asia Minor after the Greco-Turkish War (1919-1922), swelled Athens' population; nevertheless it was most particularly following World War II, and from the 1950s and 1960s, that the population of the city exploded, and Athens experienced a gradual expansion in all directions. In the 1980s it became evident that smog from factories and an ever increasing fleet of automobiles, as well as a lack of adequate free space due to congestion, had evolved into the city's most important challenge. A series of anti-pollution measures taken by the city's authorities in the 1990s, combined with a substantial improvement of the city's infrastructure (including the Attiki Odos motorway, the expansion of the Athens Metro, and the new Athens International Airport), considerably alleviated pollution and transformed Athens into a much more functional city. In 2004 Athens hosted the 2004 Summer Olympics with great success.
Athens sprawls across the central plain of Attica that is often referred to as the Attica or Athens Basin. The basin is bounded by four large mountains: Mount Aegaleo to the west, Mount Parnitha to the north, Mount Penteli to the northeast and Mount Hymettus to the east. Beyond Mount Aegaleo lies the Thriasian plain, which forms an extension of the central plain to the west. The Saronic Gulf lies in the southwest. Mount Parnitha is the tallest of the four mountains (1,413 m and it has been declared a national park.
Athens is built around a number of hills. Lycabettus is one of the tallest hills of the city proper and provides a view of the entire Attica Basin. The geomorphology of Athens is deemed to be one of the most complex in the world due to its mountains and causes a temperature inversion phenomenon which, along with the failure of the Greek Government to control industrial pollution, is responsible for the air pollution problems the city has recently faced. This issue is not characteristic of Athens alone; for intsance, Los Angeles and Mexico City also suffer from similar geomorphology inversion problems.
Athens became the capital of Greece in 1834, following Nafplion which was the provisional capital from 1829. In addition, the municipality of Athens is the capital of the Attica Periphery. Athens can refer either to the municipality of Athens or to the entire Athens Urban Area, which makes up the "City of Athens" that sprawls across the Attica or Athens Basin.
The municipality of Athens is the most populous in Greece, with a population of 745,514 people (in 2001) and an area of 39 km (15 sq mi). The current mayor of Athens is Giorgos Kaminis. It is divided into seven municipal districts. The 7-district division is mainly used for administrative purposes. For Athenians the most popular way of dividing the city proper is through its neighbourhoods such as Pagkrati, Ambelokipi, Exarcheia, Patissia, Ilissia, Petralona, Koukaki and Kypseli, each with its own distinct history and characteristics. Greater Athens consists of the central municipality of Athens and 34 more municipalities, which are divided in the four peripheral units mentioned above.
Greater Athens along with Greater Piraeus (peripheral unit of Piraeus) form the Athens Urban Area, while the larger metropolitan area includes several additional suburbs and towns surrounding the dense urban area of the Greek capital.
The city of Athens contains a variety of different architectural styles, ranging from Greco-Roman, Neo-Classical, to modern. They are often to be found in the same areas, as Athens is not marked by a uniformity of architectural style. Many of the most prominent buildings of the city are either Greco-Roman or neo-classical in styling. Some of the neo-classical structures to be found are public buildings erected during the mid-19th century, under the guidance of Theophil Freiherr von Hansen and Ernst Ziller, and include the Athens Academy, Athens City Hall, Greek Parliament, Old Parliament (1875–1932) (Now the National Historical Museum), University of Athens, and Zappeion Hall.
Beginning in the 1930s, the International style and other architectural movements such as Bauhaus and Art Deco began to exert an influence on almost all Greek architects, and many buildings both public and private were constructed in accordance with these styles. Localities with a great number of such buildings include Kolonaki, and some areas of the centre of the city; neighbourhoods developed in this period include Kypseli.
In the 1950s and 1960s during the vast extension and development of Athens, modern architecture played a very important role. The centre of Athens was largely rebuilt, leading to the demolition of a number of neoclassical buildings. The architects of this era employed materials such as glass, marble and aluminium, while some blended modern and classical elements. After World War II, internationally known architects to have designed and built in the city included Walter Gropius, with his design for the US Embassy, and, amongst others, Eero Saarinen, in his postwar design for the east terminal of the Ellinikon Airport.
Notable Greek architects of the 1930s–1960s included Konstantinos Doxiadis, Dimitris Pikionis, Pericles A. Sakellarios, Aris Konstantinidis and others.
The municipality of Athens, the city center of the Athens Urban Area, is divided into several districts: Omonoia, Syntagma, Exarcheia, Agios Nikolaos, Neapolis, Lykavittos, Lofos Strefi, Lofos Finopoulou, Lofos Filopappou, Pedion Areos, Metaxourgeio, Aghios Kostantinos, Larissa Station, Kerameikos, Psiri, Monastiraki, Gazi, Thission, Kapnikarea, Aghia Irini, Aerides, Anafiotika, Plaka, Acropolis, Pnyka, Makrygianni, Lofos Ardittou, Zappeion, Aghios Spyridon, Pangration, Kolonaki, Dexameni, Evaggelismos, Gouva, Aghios Ioannis, Neos Kosmos, Koukaki, Kynosargous, Fix, Ano Petralona, Kato Petralona, Rouf, Votanikos, Profitis Daniil, Akadimia Platonos, Kolonos, Kolokynthou, Attikis Square, Lofos Skouze, Sepolia, Kypseli, Aghios Meletios, Nea Kypseli, Gyzi, Polygono, Ampelokipoi, Panormou-Gerokomeio, Pentagono, Ellinorosson, Kato Filothei, Ano Kypseli, Tourkovounia-Lofos Patatsou, Lofos Elikonos, Koliatsou, Thymarakia, Kato Patisia, Treis Gefyres, Aghios Eleftherios, Ano Patisia, Kypriadou, Prompona, Aghios Panteleimonas, Pangrati, Goudi, Ilisia, Kaisariani
The Athens Metropolitan Area consists of 73 densely populated municipalities, sprawling around the municipality of Athens (the city center) in virtually all directions. According to their geographic location in relation to the city of Athens, the suburbs are divided into four zones; the northern suburbs (including Ekali, Nea Erythrea, Agios Stefanos, Drosia, Dionysos, Kryoneri, Kifissia, Maroussi, Pefki, Lykovrisi, Heraklio, Glyka Nera, Vrilissia, Melissia, Pendeli, Halandri, Aghia Paraskevi, Psychiko and Filothei); the southern suburbs, (including Kalamaki, Nea Smirni, Agios Dimitrios, Palaio Faliro, Elliniko, Glyfada,, Voula Argyroupoli, Ilioupoli and the southernmost suburb of Vouliagmeni); the eastern suburbs, (including Acharnes, Zografou, Vyronas, Kaisariani, Cholargos and Papagou; and the western suburbs (including Peristeri, Ilion, Egaleo, Petroupoli and Nikaia).
The Athens city coastline, extending from the major commercial port of Piraeus to the southernmost suburb of Varkiza for some 25 km (20 mi), is also connected to the city centre by a tram.
In the northern suburb of Maroussi, the upgraded main Olympic Complex (known by its Greek acronym OAKA) dominates the skyline. The whole area has been redeveloped according to a design by the Spanish architect Santiago Calatrava, with steel arches, landscaped gardens, fountains, futuristic glass, and a landmark new blue glass roof which was added to the main stadium. A second Olympic complex, next to the sea at the beach of Kallithea (Faliron), also features modern stadia, shops and an elevated esplanade. Work is underway to transform the grounds of the old Athens Airport – named Hellinikon – in the southern suburbs, into one of the largest landscaped parks in Europe, to be named the Hellenikon Metropolitan Park.
Many of the southern suburbs (such as Alimos, Palaio Faliro, Elliniko, Voula, Vouliagmeni and Varkiza) host a number of sandy beaches, most of which are operated by the Greek National Tourism Organisation and require an entrance fee, which is not excessive in most cases. Casinos operate on both Mount Parnitha, some 25 km (16 mi) from downtown Athens, (accessible by car or cable car) and the nearby town of Loutraki (accessible by car via the Athens – Corinth National Highway, or the suburban rail service (Proastiakos)).
Parnitha National Park is punctuated by well-marked paths, gorges, springs, torrents and caves dotting the protected area. Hiking and mountain-biking in all four mountains remain popular outdoor activities for many residents of the city. The National Garden of Athens was completed in 1840 and is a green refuge of 15.5 hectares in the center of the Greek capital. It is to be found between the Parliament and Zappeion buildings, the latter of which maintains its own garden of seven hectares.
Parts of the city centre have been redeveloped under a masterplan called the Unification of Archeological Sites of Athens, which has also gathered funding from the EU to help enhance the project. The landmark Dionysiou Aeropagitou street has been pedestrianised, forming a scenic route. The route starts from the Temple of Olympian Zeus at Vasilissis Olgas Avenue, continues under the southern slopes of the Acropolis near Plaka, and finishes just beyond the Temple of Hephaestus in Thiseio. The route in its entirety provides visitors with views of the Parthenon and the Agora (the meeting point of ancient Athenians), away from the busy city centre.
The hills of Athens also provide green space. Lycabettus, Philopappos hill and the area around it, including Pnyx and Ardettos hill, are planted with pines and other trees, with the character of a small forest rather than typical metropolitan parkland. Also to be found is the Pedion tou Areos (Field of Mars) of 27.7 hectares, near National Archaeological Museum.
The municipality of Athens has an official population of 745,514, while the city's metropolitan population reached 3,761,810 in 2001. The actual population, however, is believed to be higher, because during census-taking (carried out once every 10 years) some Athenian residents travel back to their birthplaces and register as local citizens there.
Reflecting this uncertainty about population figures, various sources refer to a population of around 5 million people for Athens. Also unaccounted for is an undefined number of unregistered immigrants originating mainly from Albania, other Eastern European countries and Pakistan. There are some 200,000 Muslims living in Athens.
The ancient site of the city is centred on the rocky hill of the acropolis. In ancient times the port of Piraeus was a separate city, but it has now been absorbed into forming a part of the Athens Urban Area. The rapid expansion of the city (which continues even today) was initiated in the 1950s and 1960s, because of the transition of Greece from an agricultural to an industrial nation. The expansion is now particularly toward the East and North East (a tendency greatly related to the new Eleftherios Venizelos International Airport and the Attiki Odos, the freeway that cuts across Attica). By this process Athens has engulfed many former suburbs and villages in Attica, and continues to do so. Throughout its long history, Athens has experienced many different population levels. The table below shows the historical population of Athens in recent times.
The Athens Urban Area today, consists of 40 municipalities, 35 of which make up, what is referred to as the Greater Athens municipalities, which belonged in the Athens Prefecture, and 5 of which make up the Greater Piraeus municipalities, which belonged to the (mainland) Piraeus Prefecture.
The second largest municipality of the Athens Urban Area, after the municipality of Athens, is that of Piraeus, with Peristeri and Kallithea following. The urban area spans 412 km (159 sq mi) and has a population of 3,165,823 (in 2001), which makes it one of the largest urban areas of the European Union.
The most important museums of Athens include: The National Archaeological Museum, the largest archaeological museum in the country, and one of the most important internationally, as it contains a vast collection of antiquities; its artifacts cover a period of more than 5,000 years, from late Neolithic Age to Roman Greece; The Benaki Museum with its several branches for each of its collections including ancient, Byzantine, ottoman-era and Chinese art and beyond; The Byzantine and Christian Museum, one of the most important museums of Byzantine art; The Numismatic Museum, housing a great collection of ancient and modern coins; The Museum of Cycladic Art, home to an extensive collection of Cycladic art, including the famous figurines made of white marble; and finally the New Acropolis Museum, opened in 2009, and replacing the old museum on the Acropolis. The new museum has proved considerably popular; almost one million people visited during the summer period June–October 2009 alone. A number of smaller and privately owned museums focused on Greek culture and arts are also to be found.
Athens is home to 148 theatrical stages, more than any other city in the world, including the famous ancient Odeon of Herodes Atticus, home to the Athens Festival, which runs from May to October each year. In addition to a large number of multiplexes, Athens plays host to a variety of romantic, open air garden cinemas. The city also supports a vast number of music venues, including the Athens Concert Hall (Megaron Moussikis), which attracts world-famous artists all year round. The Athens Planetarium, located in Andrea Syngrou Avenue is one of the largest and best equipped digital planetaria in the world.
Located on Panepistimiou Street, the old campus of the University of Athens, the National Library, and the Athens Academy form the "Athens Trilogy" built in the mid-19th century. Most of the university's workings have been moved to a much larger, modern campus located in the eastern suburb of Zografou. The second higher education institution in the city is the Athens Polytechnic School, found in Patission Street. This was the location where on 17 November 1973, more than 13 students were killed and hundreds injured inside the university during the Athens Polytechnic uprising, against the military junta that ruled the nation from 21 April 1967 until 23 July 1974. Another notable institution in Patission Street is the Athens University of Economics and Business, which is the oldest business school in Greece and the Agricultural University of Athens which lies at the west of city's center.
By the late 1970s, the pollution of Athens had become so destructive that according to the then Greek Minister of Culture, Constantine Trypanis, "...the carved details on the five the caryatids of the Erechtheum had seriously degenerated, while the face of the horseman on the Parthenon's west side was all but obliterated." A series of strict measures taken by the authorities of the city throughout the 1990s resulted in the improvement of air quality; the appearance of smog (or nefos as the Athenians used to call it) has become less common. Widespread measures taken by the Greek authorities throughout the 1990s have improved the quality of air over the Attica Basin. Nevertheless, air pollution still remains an issue for Athens, particularly during the hottest summer days. In late June 2007, the Attica region experienced a number of brush fires, including a blaze that burned a significant portion of a large forested national park in Mount Parnitha, considered critical to maintaining a better air quality in Athens all year round. Damage to the park has led to worries over a stalling in the improvement of air quality in the city.
The major waste management efforts undertaken in the last decade (particularly the plant built on the small island of Psytalia) have improved water quality in the Saronic Gulf, and the coastal waters of Athens are now accessible again to swimmers. In January 2007, Athens faced a waste management problem when its landfill near Ano Liosia, an Athenian suburb, reached capacity. The crisis eased by mid-January when authorities began taking the garbage to a temporary landfill.
The Athens Metro is more commonly known in Greece as the Attiko Metro (Greek: Αττικό Mετρό). While its main purpose is transport, it also houses Greek artifacts found during construction of the system. The Athens Metro supports an operating staff of 387 and runs two of the three metro lines; its two lines (red and blue, also referred to as lines 2 and 3) were constructed largely during the 1990s, and the initial sections opened in January 2000, while the lines run entirely underground. The metro network operates a fleet of 42 trains consisting of 252 cars, with a daily occupancy of 550,000 passengers.
The Red Line (line 2) runs from Aghios Antonios to Aghios Dimitrios and covers a distance of 11.6 km (7 mi). Extensions to both these lines are under construction, most notably westwards to Piraeus, southwards to the Old Hellinikon Airport East Terminal (the future Metropolitan Park), and eastward toward the easternmost suburb of Aghia Paraskevi. The eastern part is actually no extension per se, but rather an opening of new stations between the Ethniki Amyna and Doukissis Plakentias stations. The spring 2007 extension from Monastiraki westwards, to Egaleo, connected some of the main night life hubs of the city, namely the ones of Gazi (Kerameikos station) with Psirri (Monastiraki station) and the city centre (Syntagma station).
The Blue Line (line 3) runs from the western suburbs, namely the Egaleo station, through the central Monastiraki and Syntagma stations to Doukissis Plakentias avenue in the northeastern suburb of Halandri, covering a distance of 16 km (10 mi), then ascending to ground level and reaching Eleftherios Venizelos International Airport, using the Suburban Railway infrastructure and extending its distance to 39 km (24 mi).
Not run by the Athens Metro, is the ISAP (Greek: ΗΣΑΠ), the Electric Railway Company line, which for many years served as Athens' primary urban rail transport. This is today the Green Line (line 1) of the Athens Metro network as shown on maps, and unlike the red and blue routes running entirely underground, ISAP runs either above-ground or below-ground at different sections of its journey. The same operator run the original metro line from Piraeus to Kifisia; serving 22 stations, with a network length of 25.6 km (15.9 mi), an operating staff of 730 and a fleet of 44 trains and 243 cars. ISAP's occupancy rate numbers of 600,000 passengers daily.
Ethel (Greek: ΕΘΕΛ) (Etaireia Thermikon Leoforeion), or Thermal Bus Company, is the main operator of buses in Athens. Its network consists of about 300 bus lines which span the entire Attica Basin, with an operating staff of 5,327, and a fleet of 1,839 buses. Of those 1,839 buses 416 run on compressed natural gas, making up the largest fleet of natural gas-powered buses in Europe.
Besides being served by a fleet of natural-gas and diesel buses, the Athens metropolitan area is also served by trolleybuses — or electric buses, as they are referred to in the name of the operating company. The network operated by Electric Buses of the Athens and Pireaus Region, or ILPAP (Greek: ΗΛΠΑΠ), consists of 22 lines with an operating staff of 1,137. All of the 366 trolleybuses are equipped to enable them to run on diesel in case of power failure.
Athens Tram SA operates a fleet of 35 vehicles, which serve 48 stations, employ 345 people with an average daily occupancy of 65,000 passengers. The tram network spans a total length of 27 km (17 mi) and covers ten Athenian suburbs. This network runs from Syntagma Square to the southwestern suburb of Palaio Faliro, where the line splits in two branches; the first runs along the Athens coastline toward the southern suburb of Voula, while the other heads toward the Piraeus district of Neo Faliro. The network covers the majority of the Saronic coastline. Further extensions are planned towards the major commercial port of Piraeus. The expansion to Piraeus will include 12 new stations, increase the overall length of the tram by 5.4 km (3 mi), and increase the overall transportation network.
Athens is served by the state-of-the-art Eleftherios Venizelos International Airport (AIA) located near the town of Spata, in the eastern Messoghia plain, some 35 km (22 mi) east of Athens. The airport was awarded the "European Airport of the Year 2004" Award. Intended as an expandable hub for air travel in southeastern Europe, it was constructed in a record 51 months costing 2.2 billion euros, and employing a staff of 14,000. An express bus service is provided, connecting the airport to the metro system, and 2 express bus services connect the airport to the port at Piraeus and the city centre respectively. Eleftherios Venizelos accommodates 65 landings and take-offs per hour, with its 24 passenger boarding bridges, 144 check-in counters and broader 150,000 m (1,614,587 sq ft) main terminal, and a commercial area of 7,000 m (75,347 sq ft) which includes cafes, duty-free shops, and a small museum. In 2007, the airport handled 16,538,390 passengers, an increase of 9.7% over the previous year of 2006. Of those 16,538,390 passengers, 5,955,387 passed through the airport for domestic flights, and 10,583,003 passengers travelled through for international flights. Beyond the dimensions of its passenger capacity, AIA handled 205,294 total flights in 2007, or approximately 562 flights per day.
1896 brought forth the revival of the modern Olympic Games, by Frenchman Pierre de Coubertin. Thanks to his efforts, Athens was awarded the first modern Olympic Games. In 1896, the city had an approximate population of 123,000 and the event helped boost the city's international profile. Of the venues used for these Olympics, the Kallimarmaro Stadium, and Zappeion were most crucial. The Kallimarmaro is a replica of the ancient Athenian stadiums, and the only major stadium (in its capacity of 60,000) to be made entirely of white marble from Mount Penteli, the same material used for construction of the Parthenon.
The 1906 Summer Olympics, or the 1906 Intercalated games, were held very successfully in Athens. The intercalated competitions were intermediate games to the internationally organized olympics, and were meant to be organized in Greece. This idea later lost support from the IOC and these games were not made permanent.
Athens was awarded the 2004 Summer Olympics on 5 September 1997 in Lausanne, Switzerland, after having lost a previous bid to host the 1996 Summer Olympics, to Atlanta, United States. It was to be the second time Athens would have the honour of hosting the games, following the inaugural event of 1896. After an unsuccessful bid in 1990, the 1997 bid was radically improved, including an appeal to Greece's Olympic history. In the last round of voting, Athens defeated Rome with 66 votes to 41. Prior to this round, the cities of Buenos Aires, Stockholm and Cape Town had already been eliminated from competition, having received fewer votes.
During the first three years of preparations, the International Olympic Committee had repeatedly expressed some concern over the speed of construction progress for some of the new Olympic venues. In 2000 the Organising Committee's president was replaced by Gianna Angelopoulos-Daskalaki, who was the president of the original Bidding Committee in 1997. From that point on, preparations continued at a highly accelerated, almost frenzied pace.
Although the heavy cost was criticized, estimated at $1.5 billion, as is usually the case with most Olympic cities, Athens was literally transformed into a more functional city that enjoys state-of-the-art technology both in transportation and in modern urban development. Some of the finest sporting venues in the world were created in the city, all of which were fully ready for the games. The games welcomed over 10,000 athletes from all 202 countries.
The 2004 Games were judged a huge success, as both security and organization were exceptionally good, and only a few visitors reported minor problems mainly concerning accommodation issues. The 2004 Olympic Games were described as Unforgettable, dream Games, by IOC President Jacques Rogge for their return to the birthplace of the Olympics, and for superbly meeting the challenges of holding the Olympic Games. The only observable problem was a somewhat sparse attendance of some early events. Eventually, however, a total of more than 3.5 million tickets were sold, which was higher than any other Olympics with the exception of Sydney (more than 5 million tickets were sold there in 2000).
In 2008 it was reported that almost all of the Olympic venues had fallen into varying states of disrepair: according to those reports, 21 of the 22 facilities built for the games had either been left abandoned or are in a state of dereliction, with several squatter camps having sprung up around certain facilities, and a number of venues afflicted by vandalism, graffiti or strewn with rubbish. These claims, however, are disputed and likely to be inaccurate, as most of the facilities used for the Athens Olympics are either in use or in the process of being converted for post-Olympics use. The Greek Government has created a corporation, Olympic Properties SA, which is overseeing the post-Olympics management, development and conversion of these facilities, some of which will be sold off (or have already been sold off) to the private sector, while other facilities are still in use just as during the Olympics, or have been converted for commercial use or modified for other sports.