Construction work at Barra Olympic Park, the main competition cluster for the Rio 2016 Olympics, is now 92 per cent complete.
In its latest update on building progress, Rio de Janeiro’s city government announced that 12 venues across the two main Olympic Parks – Barra and Deodoro – are now “nearly complete”, compared with six venues last month (September 2015).
In Barra, finishing touches are being made to the athletes’ village (97 per cent), Olympic Aquatics Centre (94 per cent complete) and Future Arena (96 per cent), while work is still needed on the Olympic Tennis Centre (80 per cent) and the Rio Olympic Velodrome (70 per cent).
For a video animation on the progress made at Barra, click here.Work is also progressing well at Deodoro Olympic Park, the second largest competition cluster, where work on two venues – the BMX and mountain bike courses – is complete.
When complete, the Olympic Park – masterplanned by AECOM – will be a lagoon-side peninsula with a network of 15 sports venues.
Located in the Barra da Tijuca district, the main Olympic park will be anchored around three existing stadiums, used for the 2007 Pan-American Games, which were constructed over a Formula One racetrack from the 1970s.
Seven new stadiums will be constructed on the site. These include a new handball arena, designed by London studio AndArchitects in collaboration with Rio-based Lopes, Santos & Ferreira Gomes; and a Velodrome, designed by 3DReid in partnership with local form BLAC Architects.
The opening ceremony of the Rio 2016 Games will take place on 5 August and the event will run until 21 August.
For more details on the Rio Olympic Parks and facilities,
click here for the venues map for Rio 2016.
• The progress will come as a relief to the International Olympic Committee (IOC). In April 2014, IOC vice president John Coates described the preparations for the 2016 Games as “the worst ever seen”.
He said progress on the Rio’s infrastructure and venues – with two years to go at the time – was worse than it was for the Athens Games in 2004, which was notorious for delays in construction.
