Let's be honest, there is no sport in the world that can sustain a stadium of 60,000 seats better than football. But as with any event, you can't have a 45-metre distance between an audience and the action.

That's what we'll have if athletics is incorporated into the legacy plans for the Olympic Stadium - a 45-metre distance between the goal mouth and the nearest spectator seat.

Football should have been taken seriously as a sustainable legacy option for the stadium from the very beginning. It happened prior to the Commonwealth Games taking place in 2002 and the result is the highly acclaimed City of Manchester stadium. But, when considering life after 2012, the Olympic community, including LOCOG, only had eyes for a 25,000-seat stadium with athletics at its core.

When no anchor tenant or business partners were forthcoming, this athletics legacy promise for the stadium should have been rethought and alternatives discussed. That debate never happened. Now, West Ham has been left vying to keep a promise to stage an unsustainable sport at the expense of every football supporter's match-day experience.

Athletics isn't a sustainable option for a stadium on its own because both World and European Championships rotate across different countries every four years. National athletics events are well served, both now and for the future by many facilities around the rest of the UK.

If London was to host three major championships over the next 30 years, that would be considered a success. This rate of hosting one major event every ten years is not going to sustain an athletics-focused 60,000-seat stadium.

Even if it was considered worthwhile, major athletics events also need a warm-up track built adjacent to the main stadium. Is there really an appetite from the UK taxpayer to maintain this additional facility for years to come?

White elephants are created when Olympic bid book plans are not allowed to evolve within a changing landscape. London now has world-class event facilities at Wembley, The O2 and at the ICC London Excel. How would an Olympic Stadium, which currently has no hospitality facilities, compete for additional concert and events business in this market? The answer is that it couldn't. Without the sheer might of football and the partnership power of a promoter and facilities manager such as AEG, the Olympic Stadium would face a barren future after 2012.

This does NOT mean however that there is not the opportunity for an Olympic Athletic legacy as a benefit of 2012 along with other Olympic sports. London's bid in Singapore had a real vision not just for athletics but for Olympic sports in general.

UK Athletics, along with UK Sport and Sport England, should invest in a national sporting legacy facility. This could include athletics, education, science and be home to the Olympic Flame as an attraction for visitors to East London.

Take the actual London 2012 athletics track and warm-up track to Crystal Palace and leave not just a physical legacy improvement but also give generations of athletes and local kids the chance to compete where 2012 memories and dreams have played out before a global audience.

The bid which has the spectator experience and a sustainable future for the Olympic Stadium at its heart is, in my view, the only clear-cut choice. But whichever football club gets the nod, it should not distract from asking, "Why wasn't football invited to the 2012 legacy table sooner?"

David Hornby is the former commercial director of Visit London and was a member of the technical team for England's 2018 World Cup bid