From the 29 June to 2 July 2017, the eyes of the world will be on Düsseldorf, when the Tour de France starts here in Germany again – for the first time in 30 years – cheered on by hundreds of thousands of spectators and a worldwide audience of millions via live broadcasts on television and the Internet.
The Tour de France is also highly popular in the US, and has a large fan base. Hence, the visitors to the world-renowned Times Square in New York were already given a first foretaste – through the display of the campaign motif for the Grand Départ Düsseldorf 2017, and the domain reference at www.letour-duesseldorf.de on two screens (approximately 11 by 10 metres and 7 by 14 metre) of “The Reuters Sign” (7th Avenue/corner W43rd Street). The web address takes you to the town’s site www.duesseldorf.de/letour, where all the important information on the start of the Tour is available in three languages (German/French/English).
The display at Times Square was made possible by news aktuell, a company of the dpa-group, on behalf of the Office for Communication.
Mayor Thomas Geisel: “The Grand Départ Düsseldorf 2017 is probably the biggest sports event this year. So it’s right to also give the US something to look forward to, and that’s why Düsseldorf can now also be seen at Times Square in New York – I approve.”
In fact, three of the eighteen UCI WorldTour Teams - the BMC Racing Team, Cannondale Drapac and TrekSegafredo - are licensed in the US. The Tour of California (14 to 21 May), one of the races of the UCI WorldTour calendar, also takes place here. The biggest hope in US bicycle racing is Tejay Van Garderen, who leads the squad of the new generation of American cyclists.
New York Times Square is visited by 30 million tourists a year. In addition, over 231,000 employees work here in 1,500 companies. “The Reuters Sign” is one of the largest digital displays worldwide.
24 April 2017
