The Anonymous Widower

What Do We Do With the Olympic Stadium?

The row about what to do with the Olympic Stadium in Stratford after the Olympics rumbles on apace.

The original plan to turn it into a smaller 25,000 seat stadium might be a wonderful legacy for athletics, but would it be the best use of it after the Olympics. There are perhaps a couple of meetings a year that could fill such a stadium, unless the World or European Championships are held in London. And knowing London and Londoners like I do, 25,000 seats would probably be too small. So we might have a white elephant that would require lots of continuing funding.

To have a dual-use stadium as West Ham propose may not be a good idea.  Fans don’t like watching football over an athletics track and I can understand why.  I watched Ipswich play in the old Olympic Stadium in Moscow and the view was atrocious.  Especially, as I had forgotten my binoculars.  I also went to Stamford Bridge, when it still had the dog track in place and that wasn’t good either.  So I can understand the views of fans and Harry Redknapp, when they say football and athletics don’t mix.

But there is a more fundamental problem and that is that football (and cricket and rugby for that matter) rely heavily on providing a lot of corporate entertainment with boxes, restaurants and fast food bars. Athletics crowds are different, probably more knowledgeable and have different and conflicting needs.  They also stay longer making a whole day of the trip. 

There is probably only one mixed use stadium that works and that is the Stade de France in Paris. In some ways this illustrates the problems, in that the French stage football, rugby and athletics, whereas, in England, rugby has Twickenham and football has Wembley.

The question has also to be asked if athletics wants a spiritual home like football, rugby and cricket.

It probably does, but a 75,000 seater stadium would be a white elephant, costly to fund.

It could also be argued that it has a spiritual home at Crystal Palace, which has been the scene of some great days of athletics.  But it needs to be knocked down and rebuilt, preferably to a size of 30,000 seats that could be temporarily expanded to stage World or European Championships. One of the other problems of the stadium, was that it didn’t have good transport links direct from North and East London.  But this has been partly solved by the new East London Line.

In fact, it would be good for South London if the whole Crystal Palace site was properly developed as a sport and leisure park, to compliment Stratford. Very little has been done since the original palace burned down before the Second World War. And if Crystal Palace is properly redeveloped, why not do the same at Alexandra Palace?  The famous race course is still there.

What we need is a proper strategy for London, that is properly thought through.  In fact this is the main problem with the Olympic stadium in that it was built to a cost for a limited life, rather as part of a whole strategy.

I have just Karen Brady, the West Ham, Vice Chairman, on BBC Breakfast and she put a convincing case for their mixed-use plans, which would include cricket. So is this just one part of a strategy, which should include plans for North, South and West London as well.

And then there is the elephant in the room; Chelski. Arsenal have a 60,000 seat stadium and Tottenham will have one, whether they move to Stratford or not. They wouldn’t be able to develop at Stamford Bridge, but what about a new stadium, where HS2 connects to Heathrow at Old Oak Common?

So the problem is a lot bigger than just what you do with Stratford.

February 7, 2011 - Posted by AnonW | Sport | Arsenal, Athletics, Football, High Speed Two, London, Olympics, Rugby, Tottenham Hotspur