London 2012 - Olympic Recycling

The 2012 Olympic Games pose very exciting times for the United Kingdom both on the track and off it. Frequently Olympic hosts spend millions or in the UK’s case, billions, on developing arenas and the necessary infrastructure in order for the event to run smoothly and often more importantly so that the country is shown in the best way to the billions that tune in to watch the games. But my question was ‘what would we do with an 80,000 seat athletic stadium once the games have finished?’… in many cases the stadium and the money it cost to build is surplus to anyone’s needs.


However, the Olympic Park Legacy Company has worked tirelessly to develop a plan for what happens to our facilities when the games are over. Firstly it should be noted that 98% of the new facilities to be used for the games have been built by British companies, equating to 1,400 contracts and an estimated £6 billion worth of business. Secondly, the main Olympic stadium has been designed as ‘two stadiums in one’, essentially a permanent 25,000 seat stadium with a 55,000 seat skyward extension which can be removed when no longer needed.

The Stadium has been designed as a series of components in order to create an adaptable structure, which facilitates deconstruction for the purposes of post-Games requirements and re-use. For example, all the steel was bolted rather than welded and the roof structure has been designed in such a way that it can be removed or adapted in legacy for use with the smaller stadium.

Similar to my previous post, this innovation sends messages to the world, exhibiting sustainability through recycling and adaptable design