Olympic Green

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Olympic Green is the Olympic park that was newly built for the 2008 Summer Olympic Games in Beijing .

The almost 800 hectare complex is located in the north of the city, around 8.5 kilometers on the extension of the axis north of the Forbidden City . Especially to the north, the area has an increasingly pronounced park character with forest, watercourses and ornamental lakes as well as modeled hills, so that the Beijing population now has a real public park at the end of the Olympic Games.

Competition venues

Existing sports facilities

Beijing National Stadium

The Beijing National Stadium

The Beijing National Stadium , nicknamed "Bird's Nest", is the heart of the project. In addition to the athletics competitions and football finals , the opening and closing ceremonies also took place here. The stadium had a capacity of 91,000 seats during the games, but this was reduced to 80,000 seats after the games.

The National Swimming Center

National swimming center

In the National Swimming Center (with its eye-catching honeycomb casing) the swimming , art and tower diving and synchronized swimming competitions were held. It is located 150 m from the national stadium and had a capacity of 17,000 seats, which was reduced to 6,000 after the games.

The national indoor stadium

National indoor stadium

The National Indoor Stadium was the venue for handball , apparatus gymnastics and trampoline gymnastics competitions . It connects directly to the north of the National Swimming Center and, with 19,000 seats, is the largest hall that was used at the 2008 Olympic Games.

The Olympic Green Exhibition Center

China National Convention Center

The fencing competitions were held in the China National Convention Center . Furthermore, the International Broadcast Center and the main press center were housed in the Olympic Green Exhibition Center . The center covers an area of ​​270,000 m².

National tennis center

The National Tennis Center

Tennis and wheelchair tennis were played in the Olympic Green Tennis Center , which opened on October 1, 2007. The facility is located in the northwest of the Olympic Park and covers an area of ​​16.7 hectares. It has 10 competition and 6 training areas that can accommodate a total of 17,400 spectators. Today the China Open for men and women takes place annually in the tennis center .

National speed skating arena

The National Speed Skating Hall is at the 2022 Winter Olympics for the competitions in speed skating built on the site of the former hockey and archery fields. The arena will have a capacity of 12,000 spectators. After the end of the Olympic Games, the competition site is to be reduced to 6,800 seats and made accessible to the public.

Former sports facilities

The Olympic Green hockey facility

Olympic Green Hockey Field

The hockey competitions were held on two fields on the Olympic Green Hockey Field . The 11.87 hectare site offered space for 17,000 spectators. It took two years to build the best-equipped hockey facility in China. Nevertheless, even before the start of the Olympic Games, it was decided that the facility would be demolished after the Summer Olympics.

Olympic Green Archery Field

Olympic Green Archery Field

On the Olympic Green Archery Field , the competitions were in archery held. It covered 9.22 hectares and offered space for 5,000 spectators. With this facility, too, it was known from the outset that it would not be permanent, but that the site would be converted into a green area.

Other structures and facilities

Olympic Village

The approximately 66 hectare Olympic Village is also located northwest in the Olympic Green. It consists of 22 six-story and 20 nine-story buildings. The more than 1,500 apartments have a relatively high ecological standard and were almost completely sold to private buyers before the Olympic Games.

Beijing Olympic Tower

The five round roofs of the 246.8 meter high Beijing Olympic Tower, which were completed and opened in 2014, are intended to remind of the Olympic rings. When designing the towers themselves, the architect was inspired by blades of grass. It is the sixth tallest observation tower in the country and the 22nd tallest in the world. Visitors can look out over the park and the entire city of Beijing from all five platforms with a height of 186 to 243 meters.

Web links

Commons : Olympic Green  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. Olympic Forest Park Observation Tower, Beijing, China. Retrieved July 4, 2020 .
  2. Beijing Tower of Olympic Forest Park to open. August 19, 2014, accessed July 4, 2020 .

Coordinates: 40 ° 0 ′ 10.9 ″  N , 116 ° 23 ′ 12 ″  E