Participants in the study, apparently mostly tourists, are asked to sign a confidentiality agreement before seeing a brief video and then answering a series of questions on computers set up in an empty storefront in the mall.

Fraser Bullock, who served as chief operating officer of the 2002 Winter Games, said he's a cheerleader for the project — but not an investor. "The key question is, is it financially viable? I think it is, if it's done right," said Bullock, himself a fund manager.

The center would not be affiliated with the now-defunct Salt Lake Organizing Committee, which helped fund a number of legacy projects, including a display outside the University of Utah's Rice-Eccles Stadium featuring the Olympic caldron.

"The more Olympic legacies we can have, I think the better off we are," Bullock said, adding that the center would not compete with the existing facilities showcasing the 2002 Games.

The success of Salt Lake's Olympics likely would attract visitors to the center, he said. "Certainly, there's a strong, positive memory from the Games, so hopefully it would be a draw," Bullock said. "So I'm cheering them on."

City leaders have been criticized for not creating more of an Olympic legacy downtown in the past. There was a plan for SLOC to craft an Olympic-legacy plaza at Gallivan Utah Center but city leaders couldn't agree on the details and the legacy plaza was shifted to the University of Utah's Rice-Eccles Stadium.

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