SPORTS> China
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SPORTS> China
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Sound foundation for venue build-up
By Qiu Quanlin (China Daily)
Updated: 2009-07-07 13:26 Construction work on the venues for the 26th Summer Universiade, scheduled to take place in Shenzhen in August 2011, is now well-advanced and should ensure that the staging of this international student sporting festival goes off without a hitch, according to the event's organizers. Huang Guoqiang, deputy director-general of the executive office of the Games' organizing committee, said: "Work on the competition and training venues for the Universiade, both those being newly built and those being renovated, is now well in hand.
"Construction work on a number of secondary projects has already started." Some 54 venues - 29 for the actual staging of events and 25 for training purposes - will be newly built or extensively renovated prior to the opening of the Games in 2011. Construction work on the superstructure of seven new venues has already been completed, with another four projects entering the steel structure construction stage, Huang said. Design work for the construction of the Universiade Village has also begun. Most importantly, construction of the superstructure of the Universiade Center, the major venue for the opening and closing ceremonies and a number of other important events during the course of the Games, was completed at the end of April this year. The sports center, located in the Longgang district and about 15 km from Shenzhen's downtown area, includes a stadium, a gymnasium and an indoor swimming center. As well as hosting the opening and closing ceremonies, the 60,000-seater stadium will be the venue for the majority the track and field events. The gymnasium will also be used to host the basketball games, whilst up to 3,000 spectators will be able to attend the swimming events. The sports center, with its construction area of more than 300,000 sq m and an investment of around 3.5 billion yuan, is expected to become one of Shenzhen's leading sporting landmarks and one of the chief legacies of the games. An athlete's village will also be built around the sports center. Huang said: "In the future, the Universiade Center will not only play host to other world-class sports events, including athletics and indoor sports, it will also be the perfect setting for large-scale musical and dramatic performances." Construction work is also underway at another of the event's major venues, the Shenzhen Bay sports center, where soft foundation installation work is nearing completion. With a designed construction area of 256,000 sq m, construction completion is scheduled for the end of 2010 with the venue being fully operational by March 2011 - a full five months before the beginning of the Games. Set in the middle of the 15-km-long Shenzhen Bay area, the center is very close to Hong Kong and seems destined to become another significant urban scenic spot on the Shenzhen skyline.
 In other developments, work on the main media center, the headquaters for the Universiade's TV broadcasting and news reporting activities, is on course for completion by the end of the year, allowing it to come online 18 months prior to the opening of the games, a requirement stipulated by the International University Sports Federation, the Universiade's governing body. Summing up the city approach to the preparations, Huang said: "Our work on venue construction embodies our belief in the value of state-of-the-art technology, environmental protection and visitor friendliness. It also places considerable emphasis on the importance of energy conservation, clear signage and obstacle-free access for the disabled." |
