After four months of anticipation its official! Tel Aviv will be the city to host the Eurovision Song Contest 2019 in Israel. Apart from the hos city , the dates of the event were revealed. The next Eurovision Song Contest will be held on 14, 16 and 18 May 2019 , when the first and second final will take place and the grand final respectively.
From end of August EBU officials were in Israel inspecting the three candidate cities in the bid of Eurovision 2019 hosting. After last September meetings, the national broadcaster of KAN announced that the city of Eilat was dropping the race for hosting Eurovision 2019 as it didn’t meet EBU requirements. So it turned into a race for two: Tel Aviv and already two past times host city Jerusalem.
However, Tel Aviv was the frontrunner from the very beginning! The city has an International airport that is well connected with all the international airports while the same time has in disposal a large number of hotel rooms to live up to accommodation requests. Furthermore, the existence of a ready venue with 10.000 seats, the Convention Centre which is also known as the Fairgrounds, is a complex formed of various pavilions. Pavilion 2 which was completed in 2015 is the cities suggested venue for the competition. If you add to all above its modern transportation network justifies completely why Tel Aviv was eventually named as the host city of next year’s Eurovision.
Tel Aviv is the second most populous city in Israel – after Jerusalem – and the most populous city in the conurbation of Gush Dan, Israel’s largest metropolitan area. Located on the country’s Mediterranean coastlineand with a population of 443,939, it is the financial and technological center of the country. Tel Aviv has the third- or fourth-largest economy and the largest economy per capital in the Middle East. The city has the 31st highest cost of living in the world. Tel Aviv receives over 2.5 million international visitors annually.A “party capital” in the Middle East, it has a lively nightlife and 24-hour culture.Tel Aviv is home to Tel Aviv University, the largest university in the country with more than 30,000 students.
The Municipality of Tel Aviv will host the forthcoming Eurovision Song Contest at the Tel Aviv Fair Grounds. The 50,000 sq meter premises is mainly used to host conventions and events. Pavilion 2 has a capacity of accommodating circa 10,000 spectators and has hosted many musical events since it was built in 2015.
The Convention Centre Complex consists of 8 halls/pavillions and is celebrated for having hosted many musical events and concerts in recent years. Pavillion 1 and the newly built Pavillion 2 are the largest pavillions in the complex.
Tel Aviv had a very strong bid and seems to be currently the front-runner complying to all the criteria and requirements of the EBU in order to host the event.
The 2019 Eurovision host city requires to meet the following key factors:
Israel has played host to the Eurovision Song Contest twice before. Previously they have held the contest in Jerusalem in 1979 and then 20 years later in 1999. Both times they held the contest in the International Convention Center.Israel won the right to host the competition after their representative in 2018 Netta won the contest with her entry “Toy”
source: Eurovision.tv, ESCToday
