San Francisco mayor defends torch route change

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - San Francisco's Mayor Gavin Newsom told Reuters on Wednesday the Olympic torch route had to be radically changed at the last minute or the event canceled to assure public safety.

"We assessed the situation and felt that we could not secure the torch and protect the protesters and supporters to the degree that we wished," Newsom said by cell phone from the torch route on its only stop in the United States.

"As a consequence we engaged in subsequent contingency planning that we felt would keep people safe."

After announcing the torch would go from San Francisco's baseball stadium along the city's scenic waterfront, city officials at the last minute diverted the torch to a main-north south boulevard more than two miles away.

Many supporters and protesters divided by politics were unified in anger that they could not view the symbolic torch they had waited hours to see.

"Today, tensions were high but I think it was under control," said Jeff Yang, 40, a software engineer from the San Francisco suburb of Pleasanton, who immigrated to the United States in 1993 from China. "If they had been able to run the torch on the regular route, they would have shown the triumph of the Olympic spirit."

In the interview, Mayor Newsom said public sentiment was less important than safety.

"Maybe that's a success story," said Newsom, who just the day before said the routing would likely remain along the waterfront although he said it could change. "The bigger dissatisfaction would have been someone not being safe. That's all that mattered to me."

He said the city was also scrapping the planned waterfront closing ceremony, but asked that the new location not be published prior to the event.

"It was a privilege and a responsibility and the responsibility and the responsibility was keeping people safe," he said of hosting the symbolic torch run prior to Olympics.

"That did not appear to be doable with the enormity of the crowds that descended around the ballpark. That at the end of the day was the primary issue of concern."