250,000 set for Olympic parade

Up to 250,000 people are expected to take to London's streets to salute Britain's Olympic heroes.

A Team GB parade, led by gold medallists Kelly Holmes and Matthew Pinsent, will head for Trafalgar Square on Monday.

In addition to celebrating the 30-medal haul from Athens, the parade will champion the capital's bid to host the 2012 Games. Bid organisers hope it will clearly show Olympic chiefs the country's passion for sport - and the level of support they could count on if they awarded the Games to the UK.

London is competing against Paris, Madrid, New York and Moscow for the right to host the 2012 Olympics. The International Olympic Committee will meet in Singapore next July to decide on the winning city.

With Monday's parade due to be waved off by Sir Steve Redgrave from the Ritz Hotel at 1.30pm, Mayor Ken Livingstone has called on firms to let staff take a late lunch break to enjoy the free event. A fleet of open-top buses, together with new double-deckers bearing the London 2012 logo, will head east along Piccadilly to Piccadilly Circus, south down Haymarket and along Pall Mall East into Trafalgar Square.

Giant TV screens will show the parade plus footage of Team GB's successes in Greece, including in the Paralympic Games. Britain came 10th in the 2004 Olympics league table, with nine gold, nine silver and 12 bronze medals.

The athletes will attend a reception with the Queen at Buckingham Palace after the parade. Events in Trafalgar Square are due to end at

3.15pm. The parade comes as the London 2012 bid enters a critical phase. The city's final submission to the IOC, giving details of finances, security, transport and the future uses of Olympic facilities, has to be submitted on 15 November.

The IOC will then commission opinion polls across all five competing host countries, with support from the general public a key issue.

It needs to be sure the Games will be guaranteed a warm welcome - and that venues will not end up less than half-full, as happened at the start in Athens.

London Olympic chiefs, led by double Olympian Lord Coe, say nationwide support for the Games stands at 73 per cent.

Mike Lee, London 2012's director of communications, said: "We are in good shape in terms of public support, but our commitment is to build levels of enthusiasm.

"The parade is important. There's been excellent work bringing all this together, and all the Olympians will be present. There will be a lot of 2012 branding around the event, and we will unveil a new 2012 initiative."