Beijing kicks off construction of Olympic venues

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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Thursday, December 25, 2003

Beijing kicks off construction of Olympic venues

Construction of the National Stadium and the National Swimming center, two of the main venues for the 2008 Olympic Games, started on Wednesday, launching a three-year building project for the games.

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Construction of the National Stadium and the National Swimming center, two of the main venues for the 2008 Olympic Games, started on Wednesday, launching a three-year building project for the games.

With an investment of 3 billion yuan (about 360 million US dollars), the National Stadium, known as "bird's nest" because of its giant lattice-work structure of irregularly angled metal girders, will be the centerpiece of the 2008 Games.

The 80,000-seat National Stadium, located in the south of the Olympic Green, will host the opening and closing ceremonies as well as track-and-field events during the 2008 Olympics.

The National Swimming Center, being located in the Olympic Green as one of the landmark architectures, covers a floor space of 70,000 square meters.

With 17,000 seats - 6,000 permanent ones and 11,000 temporary ones, the swimming center will host swimming, diving, water polo and synchronized swimming events during the 2008 Games.

Apart from the National Stadium and the Swimming Center, the first group of venues to be built will also include the Beijing Shooting Range and the Laoshan Velodrome.

Bids for other Olympic projects, including the Olympic park on the northern edge of the city, are also under way.

Beijing promised to finish construction of its sporting facilities for the 2008 Games at least a year ahead of time so test events could be held during 2007.

The swimming centre is the only Olympic venue that is funded by donations from overseas Chinese, residents in Taiwan, Hong Kong and Macao.

"Today is a milestone in our preparations for the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games,'' said Liu Qi, president of the Beijing Organizing Committee for the Games of the XXIX Olympiad, at the opening ceremonies at National Stadium.

Liu said Beijing will do its best to fulfill its promise to the world to prepare itself to host the best-ever Olympic Games in history.

He urged good quality work with a reasonable budget to allow the venuesto become precious national treasures after the games are completed.

Representing the China International Trust and Investment Corp (CITIC) Consortium, a proprietary component for the National Stadium, Kong Dan, its general manager of the corporation vowed the consortium will give full advantages in financing and construction to ensure a first-class venue, while collaborating with the Beijing State-owned Assets Management Corp.

The consortium and the corporation jointly consist as the National Stadium Co, and will work as the proprietor of the stadium for 30 years.

At the ground-breaking ceremony for the National Swimming Centre, one of the donors, Timothy Fok from Hong Kong said, "As a Chinese, I sincerely wanted to do my bit for the 2008 Games.''

While no individual donation was encouraged for the the Games after Beijing won the right to host the event, more and more Chinese from outside the Chinese mainland expressed their strong desire to make contributions.

The government decided to select one venue -- the swimming centre -- to be funded by donations.A special committee, the Beijing Municipal Committee for Jointly Constructing Beijing Olympic Stadiums and Gymnasiums by Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan Compatriots and Overseas Chinese was established to supervise the donations.

The committee has received US$70 million so far from Chinese in 20 countries and regions. The expected investment for the centre is about US$100 million, said Qiao Wei, a committee member.

By People's Daily Online

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