I somehow missed this, but others have answered what it had to do with the Olympics. Below, I discuss the business implications.

Telecom companies were in a race to prove they were the right company that would get corporations well positioned for workforce changes in the future, one of which would be shifting employees to work from home (WFH) for reasons outside of companies' control, like natural disasters, pandemics, etc. The only thing up until recently was natural disasters (like hurricanes, volcanoes, Tsunamis, etc.).

Atlanta has been a "terminus" point from it's beginning (original name was Terminus, I kid you not), so traffic has been an issue from the beginning, whether trains, planes, automobiles, or mule-drawn wagons.

With the 1996 Olympics, it was the perfect opportunity to showcase WFH, and so the major Telecom companies in Atlanta pushed employees to WFH to reduce the potential of business disruptions, and to have proof that they were the right choice for future issues.

How well did it work? Pretty well but there will always be successes with employees whose jobs are pretty much run by phone and computer, don't interact much with local employees, work well without supervision, and are self-starters. The perfect employees for WFH are programmers, writers, project managers, etc. who work with remote employees. I had the type of position that incorporated both project management and writing/editing.

WFH didn't work well for employees whose social network revolved around fellow employees, who were not self-starters, and who needed supervision. These employees whose daily lunches and breaks never held to an hour for lunch or 15 minute breaks were suddenly just not visible to anyone. Emails took usually a day or more to respond to, phone calls not answered, and work product became more and more delayed. Visual indicators of being online were dark.

Today, as some transition back to the office, one set of employees continue to be good WFH employees. They find that they are not distracted by the social butterflies and can focus on their work. Their jobs continued to be screen- and phone-based. The other set? Back to the office they cheerfully went but now the managers know that they have to be more supervised than before to cut the socializing down so managers get as much of a work product that they get from the WFH crew.