So about that stadium.

                           

The stadium was completed at the end of March and the costs to build it were less than originally expected. The stadium took nearly three years to be built. The stadium currently seats 80,000 guests but after the Olympics they plan on breaking it down to only 25,000 seats. The U.K. newspaper the Telegraph reported on March 29 that the cost of the stadium was approximately U.S.$779 million.

The reasoning to dismantle the facility after the games is to reduce the environmental impact and because it is to big for other events. The stadium is the lightest Olympic stadium ever, it only used 10,700 metric tons of steel. In comparison to Beijing use of 110,00 metric tons. They designers made sure to keep it light because they have had the expectation that it is going to be taken apart. Instead of welded connections, the connections are bolted. With this type of construction, the building was not able to include dining and has added special podlike structures for the games to accommodate guests. They have also added extra building on the outside for this. The different bridges on the outside function for different people. Some are for public access while the others are only for athletes.

Source: Civil Engineering. American Society of Civil Engineers. Robert L. Reid. May 2011.

London: Then and Now

4 years ago, this was the news presentation about the London stadiums:

Plans for locations of events:

All of the locations:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b-OWuZCmX_A&feature=related

What is actually being built?

The majority of the buildings will be at the Olympic Park in the Lower Lea Valley near Stratford in East London. This will include the Olympic Stadium, the VeloPark, Aquatics centre and various arenas for Basketball, Handball, Fencing and Volleyball.

The Olympic Village will be built next to the Park and will home approximately 17,000 athletes and officials. After the games the village will provide housing as part of the legacy of the Games.

The Olympic Park

The Olympic Park will be built on a 500-acre site at Stratford and contain nine venues.

The main 80,000 seat Olympic Stadium will host the athletics.

The Aquatics Centre with a capacity of 20,000 will include two 50m swimming pools and a diving pool.


The Hockey Centre will comprise two stadia with capacities of 15,000 and 5,000;

The VeloPark will include the Velodrome and the BMX track;

The Olympic Multi-Sports Arena will combine four sports arenas in one building hosting Fencing, Volleyball, Basketball and Handball.

(Sources: http://www.bssa.org.uk/sectors.php?id=60)

Controversy of Mega-Eventual Proportions

A comment made by the London Assembly about the ODA (Olympic Delivery Authority) reveals the following:

´´The true costs of the 2012 Games remain shrouded in secrecy. It is totally unacceptable that the Olympic Delivery Authority refuse to be transparent and accountable given the enourmous amount of piblic money involved. The excuse that revealing budget estimates for individual programmes would jeopardise commercial sensitivity simply does not add up as other public vodies have no problem revealing this information as part of the normal tendering process´´ (Page 7)

Just thought it was kind of interesting...

Finances of the London Games

Taken from the Library of the House of Commons

Last Updated 27 July 2010

Author: Gavin Berman

Title: “Financing the London 2012 Olympic Games”

Some of the organizations involved in financing the 2012 Olympic Games are covered in detail in a blog post below. Please refer to that post for a more thorough examination of the bodies that govern the Olympics. As for finances…

The Olympic Delivery Authority (ODA) is in charge of physical infrastructure of the games, and has a budget of £8.1bn pounds, but the anticipated expenditures is at 7.3bn (So far so good)

Non ODA expenditures, such as security, brings total to £9.3bn…But this does not include legacy costs and the dismantling of the Olympic stadiums.

Paying for the Olympics:

-National Lottery (2.2bn)

-GLA OLYMPIC council tax precept (0.6bn)

-Other London (0.3bn)

-Central Government (6.2bn)

London Organizing committee for the Olympic Games (LOCOG) estimates an additional 2bn for the actual event.

1.  Bidding

·         29.1m pounds (20m from Department of Culture, Media, and Sport (DCMS) and London Developmental Agency (LDA))

2.  Preparing

·         The Olympic Village originally was planned to be funded by the private sector. Unfortunately, there was a ´´lack of identifiable revenue stream (6) and now much of it falls on the public sector. As we saw in Beijing (See below) there is a lot of waste associated with developing the Olympic Games. It is for this reason, probably, that London is promoting the widespread effort to recycle!

·         National Lottery is a big source of income. Which you can all clearly see due to the image below!!

3. Hosting=£1.5bn

·         Security is a major consideration, and due to the Terrorist attacks in London in 2005 the security forces have to be revamped. Original costs allocate £190 million for the Games

·         You guys probably have enough reading to do for your other classes…But you should check out the graphs below to see just how much uncertainty and yearly changes there is involving the finances of this Mega-Event

Magically Relevant

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RQu3T5Xy8TI

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DpEawduUW7o

Governance of the Olympics

The organization of the Olympic Games is entrusted by the International Olympic Committee (IOC) to the National Olympic Committee (NOC) of the country of the host city as well as to the host city itself. The NOC forms, and from then communicates directly with the IOC, from which it receives instructions.

                                              

The Executive body includes: the IOC member or members in the country; the President and Secretary General of the NOC; and at least one member representing, and designated by, the host city. In addition, it generally includes representatives of the public authorities and other leading figures.

From the time of its constitution to the time it is dissolved, the committee must comply with the Olympic Charter, the contract entered into between the IOC, the National Olympic Committee and the host city (Host City Contract) and the instructions of the IOC Executive Board.

The Organizing Committees grow from small organizations of tens of employees to reach several thousand only seven years later. The Organising Committee starts its work with a period of planning followed by a period of organisation which culminates in the implementation or operational phase at Games time.

The main tasks for the Organizing Committees of the Olympic Games are:

To give equal treatment to every sport on the programme and ensure that competitions are held according to the rules of the International Sports Federations (IFs);

To ensure that no political demonstration or meeting is held on Olympic sites;

To choose and, if necessary, create the required installations: competition venues, stadiums and training halls; to arrange for the required equipment;

To lodge the athletes, their entourage, the officials;

To organise medical services;

To solve transportation problems;

To meet the requirements of the mass media in order to offer the public the best possible information on the Games;

To organize cultural events that are an essential element of the celebration of the Olympic Games;

To write the Final Report on the celebration of the Games in the two official languages and distribute it within two years after the end of the Games.

Jacques Rogge, President of International Olympic Committee, quotes "Without the support of the business community, without its technology, expertise, people, services, products, telecommunications, its financing - the Olympic Games could not and cannot happen. Without this support, the athletes cannot compete and achieve their very best in the world's best sporting event."

The Olympic Games are one of the most effective international marketing platforms in the world, reaching billions of people in over 200 countries and territories throughout the world. Support from the business community is crucial to the staging of the Games and the operations of every organisation within the Olympic Movement. Revenue generated by commercial partnerships accounts for more than 40% of Olympic revenues and partners provide vital technical services and product support to the whole of the Olympic Family. Each level of sponsorship entitles companies to different marketing rights in various regions, category exclusivity and the use of designated Olympic images and marks. However, no 'field of play' advertising is permitted. The Olympic Games are the only major sporting event in the world where there is no advertising in the stadium or on the athletes.

How does a company get recognition and advertisement from the Olympics when there is not even any advertisement in the Olympic games stadiums? What is your take on this procedure, Let us know.

Cool and Enlightening Pictures

In reading these two very revealing pictures, one understands that there is a very lucrative market in the Olympics. However, the majority of substantial profits are made by, as one might expect, the body that governs the Olympics, the IOC.


It is interesting to note in the photo above that after the Olympics end, there is an experienced decline in national GDP in all Olympics between ´88 and ´04 in both the year of the Olympics and the following year (the one exception is in Montreal for the year of the Olympics).