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London Begins `Nitty-Gritty' Work as Olympic Inspection Nears
07/06/2007 |
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London 2012 organizers, preparing for a visit by Olympic inspectors, are getting down to the ``nitty- gritty'' of how to feed, transport and keep safe the athletes and spectators, according to the chief project manager.
International Olympic Committee delegates will visit June 12-14 to assess progress on the main venue in the east of the city, and will be the first passengers on a rail link to the Olympic park. After 18 months of foundation work, London is getting into what the executive charged with building the venues called the ``operational planning'' for the games.
``We're starting to really understand the detail of how the park is going to work,'' James Bulley, the director of Venues and Infrastructure for the London Organizing Committee of the Olympic Games, said in an interview yesterday. ``The clear message is that we're on track and we're up and running.''
Rising costs and adverse publicity have blighted the project. The construction budget spiraled to 9.3 billion pounds ($18.5 billion), the logo unveiled this week was vilified in the national media and the Geneva-based Centre of Housing Rights and Eviction yesterday said more than 1,000 people will be displaced from their homes because of the Olympics, Europe's largest building project.
The scale of work required is too big, according to Lord William Howie of Troon, a former civil engineer who's now a lawmaker in the House of Lords.
``The IOC is suffering from vainglory and wants to demonstrate its greatness by building things,'' he told a conference yesterday at Wembley Stadium, which will stage the final of the soccer tournament. ``The idea that you require an immense amount of new stadia is rather overblown.''
Beds and Toilets
Bulley's committee has a budget of 2 billion pounds and is charged with delivering 35 sports venues, a 17,000-bed Olympic village and, among other projects, the installation of 5,000 temporary toilets.
``We've set up the management teams and processes and we're now starting to plan how we implement what we actually want to deliver,'' Bulley said.
As many as 600 people are currently working on the Olympic site, with the installation of power cables at a cost of 200 million pounds near completion. About 20 percent of the area has been cleared and construction work will begin first on the village and then the aquatics center, Bulley added.
Organizers have already had to dip into their 2.7 billion- pound contingency fund to clear contaminated land and prepare unstable ground, according to Bulley.
On Schedule
``With any project of this nature you start with what you want to deliver and then you hit issues along the way,'' said Bulley, who's been seconded from London property consultant Drivers Jonas. ``The big picture is that we are absolutely on track to deliver venues by the right date.''
Bulley said he's starting to look at how spectators will exit the 80,000-seat track and field arena on any given day and whether they'll stay in the nearby park, visit another Olympic venue or go home. He's also examining the catering, security and travel implications of getting athletes from the village to venues across the city in 30 minutes.
To do so, he's enlisted the help of Australians who worked on the 2000 Games in Sydney. The 2012 edition will result in skilled British professionals who can sell their expertise worldwide, he said.
U.K. Legacy
``When you trawl the market, these are the guys that have done this recently and they have a great knowledge and skill base,'' said Bulley, who previously worked on Lisbon's Stadium of Light. ``One of the things I've committed to do is to leave the same legacy for the U.K.''
The ``operational planning'' phase will run through to the 2008 Olympics in Beijing. Venues have to be completed a year before the London Games to allow for testing, Bulley said. Critics of the cost for the projects, which has risen from an initial estimate of 2.4 billion pounds, need to think more long- term, he added.
``It's hard to see now what you'll get from 2012, but there'll be an incredible difference to a deprived community,'' said Bulley. ``Ten years beyond the games, people will hold this up as a blueprint of how to bring forward a development.''
(Source: Bloomberg.com)
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