LONDON 2012 - Summer Olympic Games / Games of the XXX Olympiad

[Melb_aviator]

One thing I want to ask is what do British people think about all this going on at the present time? The amount of money being spend is huge, all for 2 weeks worth of event, then a lot will be taken down. with the current financial measures in place or underway, is there any resentment in the community?

Its a massive site, with so much going on. The landscaping will make of break it all. Hopefully then will get those trees and gradss in with plenty of time to grow and settle in, unlike most cities who have left things till late, and landscaping was the last priority.

Love the Aquatic Centre and Velodroe most, with the basketball centre up there too. For a temporary venue, that is a most impressive structure.

[RobH]

One thing I want to ask is what do British people think about all this going on at the present time?

Some people think it's great, others not so much. I'm not completely sure the recession has changed many people's minds. If you were pro before you probably still are and visa versa - though I would say the antis have mellowed in their stance.

Firstly, I must point out support for the Games has always been solid. Polls have always shown support around the 70% range. This hasn't changed in the last two years and, if anything, seeing real structures emerging from the mud has excited people more.

The recession has been a double-edged sword for the perception of the Olympics I suppose.

The obvious response would be "why are we spending all this money on this now?". And I have heard that point of view several times. The truth is though, and even the harshest critics of 2012 recognise this, there is no going back. It's an unstoppable juggernaught and doing a bad job or pulling back from hosting would do irreperable damage to our international profile, and hurt the economic recovery. Those who were against the Games coming here are reluctantly supportive now, because there is no other option.

But, counterituitivly, the recession could also be said to have bolstered support. Firstly, thousands of people are in work on the construction site who mightn't otherwise be. Secondly, it's a good news story in a time of financial gloom and London is doing a rather good job (against certain people's and certain newpaper's *spit* expectations and predictions). Thirdly, £7bn on a hugely positive regeneration scheme with a big party at the start of it doesn't sound like quite so much money when your government is, at the same time, bailing out the banks to the tune of tens of billions of pounds - money thrown down the drain. A small fraction of that on an Olympics? Hell yeah, we deserve it!

And of course, the government will be looking forward to basking in the glow in two years. They'll happily knock the previous government's spending in many areas but they won't do this for the Olympics. Why is this, you ask? Because of spending cuts in public services, they know they'll most likely be an unpopular mid-term government looking for a boost in the polls by 2012. The Olympics are important to them in that sense and aside from a token £27m cut in the ODA's budget, they've not tampered with the project at all. It'll be one massive bit of good news in the midst of government spending cuts and they'll cling onto that for all it's worth.

So yes, we're all in this together. Most are behind the Games; the majority enthuisiastically, a minority reluctantly (becuase there's no going back and a botch job will do more harm to our economy than good), and the new government for genuine as well as political reasons. In a weird way, the recession may have brought people together behind the project more.

[PortoNuts]

And the Games will probably boost the recovery, with the influx of tourists and spending. And I think they have been managing the budget well (delivering things on time and not going over-bufget). And certainly providing a much needed regeneration to East London. If it wasn't for the Games, they would only build Stratford shopping centre I suppose.

[PortoNuts]

London 2012 venues on track to be finished next year

15 Jul 2010
london2012.com

The Olympic Delivery Authority (ODA) has completed its latest set of milestones on time and within budget, as the ‘big build’ construction project moved into its final year. New aerial images of the Olympic Park have been released showing the good progress being made across the site

In summer 2009, the ODA set out 10 milestones – ‘The Big Build: Structures’ – outlining how the main structures of the London 2012 venues and essential new infrastructure would take shape and be nearing completion by this summer.

The final milestone has now been completed, with water beginning to fill the new Lee Valley White Water Centre being built in Hertfordshire, meaning that all 10 milestones have been achieved on time.

A new set of milestones – ‘The Big Build: Completion’ – was unveiled today which covers the final stage of the construction project. The milestones outline how, by summer 2011, the structures of the main venues will be complete and ready to be handed over for testing, with all major new infrastructure finished and landscaping work well advanced across the Olympic Park.

Olympic Delivery Authority (ODA) Chief Executive David Higgins said: ‘By setting out clear milestones right from the start of the project, we have offered a window into the delivery of this unprecedented construction project, allowing people to judge our progress for themselves.

‘We are in good shape for the home straight but the last leg of the race is often the hardest and we are not complacent about the many challenges still ahead.’

Hugh Robertson, Minister for Sport and the Olympics, added: ‘It is thanks to the hard work and dedication of the ODA, and its workforce, that the project has hit all its milestones again this year. With the majority of the construction phase now complete we are in an excellent position for the staging and testing work to being next summer.’

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http://www.london2012.com/news/2010/...-next-year.php

[Mr.Underground]

What is in third pic that grey pavillon over the handball Arena?

[TheoG]

The grey building is the IBC and MPC, I'm pretty sure

[broncoempire]

Originally Posted by Mr.Underground

What is in third pic that grey pavillon over the handball Arena?

That building is the International Broadcast Centre and the Main Press Centre.



Here is how it will appear during the Games.



Both pictures courtesy of the LONDON 2012 Official Website.

[Mr.Underground]

Ok, thanks for the answers. It is terrible.

On my opinione best venues are aquatic center and velodrome.

[italiano_pellicano]

nice pictures

[PortoNuts]

london2012.com

Scroll >>>>>>

[Anubis2051]

Originally Posted by broncoempire

That building is the International Broadcast Centre and the Main Press Centre.



Here is how it will appear during the Games.



Both pictures courtesy of the LONDON 2012 Official Website.

Does that building have ANY windows?!?!? It looks like a coffin.

[broncoempire]

I don't know about windows but I could swear I read in one of the different sets of planning documents that there may be plans for rooftop studios for some of the broadcasters during the games. I don't remember whether they were to be in the same building or something equivalent to the Linglong Pagoda from Beijing, however.

[PortoNuts]

Olympic Stadium

londo2012.com

[PortoNuts]

Olympic Village

by Ecological.

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[Big Cat]

Wow

[PortoNuts]

Get the party started - London will be the star of 2012



Never mind the sport: London is set for four weeks of fantastic entertainment as host city of the 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games.

Apart from the opening and closing ceremonies of both sporting extravaganzas — for which the Oscar-winning British film directors Stephen Daldry and Danny Boyle are spearheading a team of internationally renowned talent — there will be parties, concerts, events and spectacles taking place across the city, potentially including light shows at London landmarks and performances on the Thames.

Live sites around the city will offer both big-screen coverage of Olympic events and entertainment by stars of the calibre of Mick Jagger and Robbie Williams, plus performances by Britain's leading arts, opera and dance companies. The kind of gymnastic and acrobatic acts Simon Cowell unearthed in Britain's Got Talent could also be included, as could large-scale Bollywood dance numbers to please both Londoners and the international crowd.

Sites are planned for Victoria Park in Hackney, which can accommodate 40,000 people, and Potters Fields near City Hall, for about 6,000 (there is also a permanent Olympic live site at Woolwich, one of several around the country). Other London locations, for 5,000 to 6,000 people, are to be confirmed at Jubilee Gardens on the South Bank and at King's Cross — near the terminal for the Javelin train to the Olympic site.

But the biggest party of all will be at Hyde Park. City Hall and the Royal Parks are negotiating a multi-screen, multi-stage venue in the park that will bring sport and spectacle to up to 60,000 people a day, from 11am to 11pm over the 17 days of the Olympics.

No names are confirmed yet as the project is out to tender among producers, but organisers speak of “big international and national names” — undoubtedly of the magnitude of Madonna or a re-reformed Led Zeppelin — plus companies from blue-chip British flagship venues like the National Theatre and Royal Opera House.

Alongside sport and live and filmed performance, there are plans for “experiential”, interactive entertainments along the lines of Coke's environmental pavilion at the Vancouver Winter Olympics, which drew 2,000 visitors an hour and included a Wii game where punters played a polar bear looking for an ice floe. What's more, entrance to the Hyde Park events, like those at the other live sites, is planned to be completely free.

Tickets will be bookable online, with the possibility of some admissions on the day. (As in so many areas of the 2012 games, this is a careful balancing act. Since some people who book free tickets for events invariably fail to turn up, organisers don't want vast empty tracts of space at Hyde Park: similarly, they don't want thousands of people waiting for hours for admission, as at Vancouver, “which introduced the new Olympic sport of queuing”.) The cost of the entertainment at the live sites is to be met by key sponsors, with the possibility of commercial events at Hyde Park in the run-up to the Games.

But if you can't get tickets to top events at the stadium, velodrome or aquatic centre, or a ringside seat to the opening or closing ceremonies, or even make it along to Hyde Park or the other big screen parties, don't despair.

Mayor Boris Johnson is negotiating with local authorities to relax restrictions on street parties and will supply cash to “animate” each London borough, “which could mean lamp-post banners or could mean a party in Bromley park to coincide with the opening ceremony” according to the Mayor's director of marketing, Dan Ritterband. (City Hall is also working on an online diary and phone app that will list all sporting and cultural events across London during the Olympics, and afterwards, as part of the Games' legacy.)

Besides, over the next two years, the Olympics will be all around us. Ritterband says that the city will be “dressed” with a view to accentuating its beauty and its famous landmarks, rather than swamping the streets with Olympic branding and streetlamp posters. One intriguing prospect is for a video screen which could actually rise from the Thames. And it's not just about making Londoners feel welcome at the Games, but also people from around the UK and the rest of the world.

In addition to the 70,000 volunteers to be recruited by the Olympic authorities to help on the Stratford site, the Greater London Authority will recruit 8,000 “ambassadors or hosts” to raise “the level of visitor welcome” across the city. They join a raft of celebrity ambassadors, both formal and informal, promoting the games in various ways, from Stella McCartney — who will design Team GB's sporting kit — to enthusiastic national treasure Stephen Fry and sporting legends such as Lord Coe, David Beckham and Sally Gunnell. And the mascots Wenlock and Mandeville — named for the villages of Much Wenlock, which inspired the launch of the modern Olympics, and Stoke Mandeville, where the Paralympics were founded — will be everywhere.

Hundreds of actors will take the colourful, cyclopean characters to schools throughout London and around the country (once problems with the costumes, which prevented them from freely moving their limbs, are solved). They will also feature as soft toys from beanie to giant size, on stationery and lunch boxes, and on clothing from festival sponsors.

John Lewis will this week start selling mascot toys in the merchandising concession in its Oxford Street branch and will gradually roll out the merchandising to the rest of its store network (the company is an “anchor tenant” of the new Westfield shopping centre at Stratford, overlooking the Olympic site). The two characters were specifically designed to appeal to the young and to digital consumers, so they already have a huge presence on social networking sites such as Facebook.

“One of our ambitions has always been to make these everyone's games,” says Bill Morris, the former BBC stalwart who now glories in the title of director of culture, ceremonies, education and live sites for London 2012. He says Stephen Daldry and his three co-producers leapt at the chance to oversee the four major ceremonies, and to re-examine established Olympic protocols around torch-bearing and medal-giving. Danny Boyle's reaction was “instant passion about the creative challenge but also a sense of civic duty, that this was what he wanted to do”, when he was asked to direct the opening ceremony.

The creatives who will helm the other Olympic and Paralympic ceremonies are yet to be appointed, so planning remains at an early stage, although Boyle and Daldry insist they won't be falling back on their greatest movie hits: no dancing Slumdogs or Billy Elliot boys. Daldry talks about “taking the opening event outside the stadium and into London”, and Boyle has talked about taking inspiration from the East End's dockland heritage, and “the river [as] the focal point of the city”. It seems likely the Thames may feature in the opening ceremony and throughout the entertainment accompanying the games — perhaps in the final stages of the torch relay, perhaps involving that submersible video screen.

In all the ceremonies, everyone involved agrees, there will be a balance between celebrating London's history and its present and future as a multicultural city (where many Olympic teams will find a ready-made home crowd) in a world emerging from recession. There will be none of the bombast of the Beijing ceremonies, or the tweeness (buses, bobbies and Beckham hoofing a football) of the British hand-over ceremony there.

“I don't think we should feel the need to compete with Beijing,” says Daldry. Boyle talks about harnessing crowds as part of the spectacle, rather than as mere spectators. The opening and closing ceremonies for London's 2012 games, and the accompanying entertainments, will be about inclusion, reflecting an inclusive city.

“We're not even really thinking about Beijing any more,” says Bill Morris. “We will be celebrating what an amazing city London is, and the UK more generally — our unique position in the world. The morning after the opening ceremony, just before the sport starts, London should feel that it is walking on water.”

http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/standa...he-olympics.do

[PrevaricationComplex]

Originally Posted by PortoNuts

london2012.com

Scroll >>>>>>

nice. was wondering why they didnt just rediriect that section of rail-track around where the warm up track is gonna be, looks like they have. It'll look good, there'll be a good sense of continuity hopefully throughout the whole park as well.

[PrevaricationComplex]

anyways. i thought i should draw attention away from stuff thats under construction...

^ from the arena's website no copyrights.

ugly bugger the one in the foreground (docklands, or excel arena to give it its slave name), no doubt the dome is the one that'll get all the attention from the aerial shots of the intnl media and us architecture buffs here. however, the excel is pivotal to Londons capability of hosting the games, an unsung hero if you will. its amazing if you think about it. possibly 4 other brand new arenas would have been needed to be built otherwise. thats enough to have put some cities off from bidding. part of Londons existing entertainment/commericial infrastructure complex that imo is more important than some of the new builds, and should be part of the blueprint of future bidders assessments of the goods they have/need and plan for when thinking of legacy infrastructure from the very begining.

this is what allows you the flexibility to build temporary yet bold boutique basketball arenas and handball arenas that convert successfully into community use afterwards. or badminton theatres if you're Athens. a legacy of good urban planning thats irrelevant of the games. too often blue ribband projects like the hadid compromise get legacy needs tacked on as an after-thought or box ticking exercise.

[PortoNuts]

The Velodrome





http://www.skyscrapercity.com/showpo...&postcount=189

[PortoNuts]

Basketball Arena





http://www.skyscrapercity.com/showpo...&postcount=214