As an open space, the park is subject to weather conditions, but also to schools calendar and working hours. During spring and fall, the space and aquatic centre are utilized by schoolchildren. During the summer, schools are closed, and when students and children are on holiday, the park is highly frequented by local communities, especially families and moms with children.
Only a few shelters are available, so, by contrast, low temperatures, dark, and wind discourage to access it. As Table 3 shows, data collected from the behavioural maps confirmed that the park is mostly used during spring and summer, and in the central hours of the day. Indeed, families with young children enjoy the play areas, and, in particular, water fountains, while sportsmen enjoy running and cycling. The overall park is well maintained and clean, and, as some site visits highlighted, during weekdays, one can frequently see workers in charge of the maintenance, including the green management.
The landscape is also well maintained, with a wide variety of vegetation, play areas, fountains and water features. Some landmarks art works are also located within the park. Comfort and accessibility are provided in all the points observed.
There are many pedestrians and cycle paths. There is a main information point near the Stratford entrance, open daily, where to find maps and gadgets, and organize guided tours.
Signage and information maps also available in every corner of the park, to ease way finding. Safety and security are also provided, with the presence of CCTV cameras, lights, and also some policemen. The park is open 24 h a day, but it has fences and gates that can be closed in case of necessity.
Regarding people and flows, the data collected from the behavioural mapping sheets showed that the park is more utilized by young families, moms and children, and athletes. The North and South areas offer different insights.
International tourists are also increasingly visiting the space, and, every week, even during the winter, two guided tours of 2 h each are organized at the information point. The activities provided are different; however, the park is mostly utilized for recreational purposes. It provides two main playground areas, but also some water features that are mainly used by children.
During the summer time, especially during the weekends, groups of people enjoy visiting the park for a stroll or a picnic, or for relaxing and resting. Between June and September, many additional activities and events are held for families and young people.
The space offers direct access to sports facilities as the aquatic centre or the velodrome, but it is also equipped with pedestrian and cycle paths. With consideration to flows, what emerged from the observations, is that the park is most frequented during weekends and in the middle of the day, between 11 a.
Regarding demographics, the majority of users are local young mothers with their children, and athletes. During the weekdays, schoolchildren also visit the park. During the weekends, the typologies of visitors increase, including more adults, singles, and tourists. Finally, regarding ethnicity and equitability, it is worth to remember that the Newham is one of the most ethnically diverse boroughs of London.
Among the five sports venues in the park, the aquatics centre is the most utilized, especially in the afternoon and weekends. It is open every day from 6 a. The velodrome and its outdoor BMX and mountain bikes tracks are also frequented, being the only cycling centre in London.
The Olympic stadium was closed and under renovation at the time of the observations. It was partially reopen for the rugby world cup in October , and it fully reopened in the end of with a capacity of 54, The Lee Valley Hockey and Tennis Centre is only partially utilized, especially during weekends and in the middle of the day.
It also hosts major international events, as the EuroHockey Championships, organised in August The sports venues are managed by social enterprises and are accessible to local communities and tourists.
However, a ticket is required to access the aquatic centre, the velodrome, and the tennis centre. With reference to the term legacy, although legacy is usually indented as anything left after the event, the majority of the interviewees underlined that more than giving a standardised definition, it is important to set and define realistic objectives and long-term goals, and to have a strong vision. The political context is also an important element for achieving a positive and successful legacy.
Indeed, hosting cities need political stability, strong leadership, and clear vision, but also the capability to plan and deliver long-term projects. While a mega-event usually lasts two or three weeks, legacies are durable, they last for more than a generation, for 30—40 years. Legacies need to be planned carefully.
This strategy includes balancing temporary and permanent infrastructure and considering not only the physical impact but also the social side. In the case of London, this included a strong focus on integration and convergence, with the aim of providing all Londoners the same opportunities, and fill the gap between the rich West and East London.
Some of the experts also suggested a flipped approach , in which first to plan what will happen after the event and then adapt the event to the legacy requirements. To illustrate, in the case of the Games, London strongly needed a new aquatics complex, because the city had very few public swimming pools. So, a new aquatics centre was built for the Games, but thinking about legacy. The venue has now a capacity of seats with an additional seats available for major events; however, during the Games, two temporary wings were added to increase the capacity to 17, seats, which is the IOC requirement.
The wings have now been removed to avoid white elephants. Regarding the case of London, some achievements and pitfalls can be highlighted. Firstly, the city introduced the concept of early legacy planning. Indeed, the city established both a plan i. To illustrate, one of the objectives of the London Plan is to reduce the imbalance between the West and East side of London, and the choice of locating the Olympic Park and Village in Stratford, East London, aimed at accelerating this convergence.
In this sense, the Games were intended as a means for creating jobs and work opportunities, and training and education programs for local communities were developed before the Games. The major focus was on regeneration, not only physical, but also social convergence , to allow Londoners to have all the same opportunities and reduce the gap with the wealthier West London.
From a physical point of view, before the Games, the Olympic site was a complex area, very disaggregated and fragmented, full of rivers and canals, and extremely polluted. The Olympics accelerated its regeneration. Three different master plans were realized one for the event, one for the transformation mode, and one for legacy mode to plan and deliver a new public park and state-of-the-art venues, which are accessible to local communities and all Londoners i. Another successful achievement was the investment on public transport.
Stratford, the main access point to the area, was already well connected before the Games, but it is now reached by two metro lines, some over ground and DLR Dockland Light Railway connections, a bus station, and a high-speed train station. Also, one of the aims was also to create a mixed-use district, providing commercial, recreational, cultural and residential areas. Indeed, the Olympic Village was transformed into the East Village, a new community with around flats, half of them of affordable and social housing, while three universities and other cultural institutions have plans to open new branches in Stratford.
Although the Westfield shopping centre was an independent project, not related to the Games, its proximity to the Olympic park and village helped in creating more than 10, jobs, many of them part-time and reserved to women, allowing them to manage work and family.
In addition, many other commercial and offices spaces are under construction around the park and the metro station. The main issues relate to costs and expenditures, and the management of the Olympic stadium.
Regarding the first one, the management of all major events always shows a discrepancy between the planned budget in the bid book and final costs, and London is not an exception in this. An initial overall budget of 9 billion Pound House of Commons Committee of Public Accounts was indicated in the bid, while according to many interviewees, the real expenditure reached 24 billion, almost three times the original planned cost.
Also, funding the park and its maintenance will be a difficult issue in the future. Greater London Authority committed itself promising sports facilities to be managed by social enterprises and to be accessible to local communities. So, balancing costs and revenues will be a challenging task. Where to collect the funding necessary to maintain the park and its facilities?
How much money will be needed to maintain and keep the park and the area and public spaces? GLA will soon have to answer these questions. Besides, the stage of mega sports events always creates inefficiencies, because even in the best cases, hosting cities have to plan and deliver certain activities and infrastructure that will not be needed anymore after the event is concluded. In the worst cases then, white elephants and underutilized infrastructure are what is left once the event is over.
These inefficiencies are also linked to the frequent changes to venues and the overall plan. The Olympic stadium offers an example. The evolution of its design has not been straightforward, increasing costs and expenditures. The original aim was to largely disassemble it after the games, reducing the 85, seats to a capacity of 25,, with the lower tier remaining in place as a permanent athletics facility.
However, later on, the government changed the initial plan for a multi-sport stadium. Temporary vs. However, it is still an exorbitant cost: how much does it cost to build and then dismantle a temporary venue?
Legacy plans vs. However, many other countries do not have these capabilities. The post-occupancy evaluation of the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park revealed important findings about the management of the Games and their legacy.
From a governance point of view, the major strengths were the synergy of the Olympic bid with the London master plan, and the strong vision and political willingness to start and achieve a process of convergence and integration of the East London. The transformation of Stratford and the borough of Newham was already planned and it would have happened in any case, although more slowly, especially considering the deep economic crisis of , and the political change at local change of Mayor in and national level in The Olympics have indeed triggered and accelerated this process of transformation.
Another successful strategy was the inclusion of a chapter devoted to legacy in the bid book and the founding of a legacy plan and body well in advance and already in place before the beginning of the Games.
De facto, the Olympics gave rise to a change of perspective, putting legacy and the post-event use in the foreground. Firstly, there was a careful planning of the use of permanent, already existing, and temporary venues and infrastructure. Permanent facilities were built only when beneficial to local communities, and the aquatics centre exemplifies this strategy. In addition, three master plans were designed in the planning phase: one for the event, one for the transition mode, during the time needed to transform the park and dismantle the unnecessary infrastructure, and one for the legacy mode.
Also, the capability of planning and implementing complex projects, along with the right time management, allowed to have all the venues ready at least one year before the Games, and, in this way, to have time enough to focus not only on the two-week event, but to be able to focus on the post-Games usage.
The economic side is probably the most vulnerable. As in the majority of mega-events, also in the case of London the budget presented in the bid underestimated the real costs, and final expenditures almost tripled the initial spending plan. In addition, the crisis of pushed away all private investors, leaving the state with the task of covering all expenses.
This was translated, among other solutions, in a council tax hike of 20 lb per household per year, particularly unfair for low-income families. In addition, the cover of the expenditures for the maintenance of the park and sports venues is another major issue. The environmental impact presents several achievements. Before the Games, the park was an area of 75 ha of polluted and contaminated soil and water.
The Olympics allowed reclaim these lands and give a new park and open space to the local communities. For this purpose, an onsite soil-washing centre was built to reduce distance that soil had to travel. In addition, great attention was given to the sustainability of each single venue and Olympic Village. Finally, the site is highly accessible by public transport, another achievement from a sustainability point of view.
The Games focused on integration and convergence, from both a physical and a social perspective. The aim for staging the Olympics was to return an open space to Londoners, physically integrating the park with the surrounding areas, and providing local communities with a sense of ownership, pride, and opportunity. The lack of accessibility and the complex topography, made by rivers, islands, roads and railways were overcome with the creation of bridges, and pedestrian and cycle paths.
In addition, the provision of mixed-use areas around the park and several means of transportation helped in the process of convergence with Western London. The park was located in a polluted and abandoned area, so the Games did not create displacement; however, the regeneration accelerated by the Games led to forms of gentrification, with an increase in house prices. To conclude, there are ways to optimise the Olympic budget and foster beneficial legacies, and some of them were at least partially utilized in London.
For example, the use of temporary facilities that are dismantled just after the event is very helpful, as it helps in avoiding white elephants and maintenance costs. Over 4million people have made a splash at the London Aquatics Centre LAC , which also teaches 1, school children a week to swim, 3. The Slide at the ArcelorMittal Orbit regularly sells out during school holidays and has received rave reviews as one of the best activities in London despite only just celebrating its second birthday.
The Stadium was the last venue to reopen. Even before transformation had been completed, the venue hosted events including the Rugby World Cup, international Rugby League, motorsport, the Anniversary Games and World Athletics Championships. And the Park is not just a place to visit, many people are now choosing to live and work here.
Work is also already underway on East Wick and Sweetwater, the next two neighbourhoods to be built and, in September , Mossbourne Riverside Academy opened as the first new school at the Park. Through these plans, the Park has already delivered innovations such as the multi-generational home, the largest free-to-access wifi network in an urban parkland, and recognition of the Park as a European Smart, Sustainable District.
Dizzee is now reading regeneration critiques and preaching about gentrification. So which narrative is correct? But is the area a success or failure? And who wins the legacy medal?
As ever, it depends on who you are — and whether you see the Olympic Park as …. Ken Livingstone, then the mayor of London , made it perfectly clear why the Olympics would be a boon. The original Stratford City project was launched in the late s as a 1. Fletcher Priest was already designing what became the village and the parkland around.
You might assume that booster made the planning easier. Not exactly. Now retired, she was originally head of development and building control at Newham council, before becoming head of planning at the Olympic Delivery Authority ODA when the bid was won, and finally head of the LLDC when the Games were over.
The ODA, she notes, were legally required to build a school and a health centre — but then went lukewarm. A year ago, Ramsey went for a wander around the East Village residential development. Campaigners, however, say the affordable housing targets set for the residential developments in the Olympic Park have been revised down. Managed by Triathlon, a partnership between housing associations East Thames and Southern Housing Group and developer First Base, they are comprised of social rent properties that went to people from Newham and other east London boroughs, discount market rent and shared ownership properties.
The Philbeys were one of the first residents to move into Ursa Mansions, just before Christmas. Although you are still living in London, it feels like you are not.
There are green areas where I take the kids to run around. She loves the mix of social and private housing. A lot of families with children. Quite a lot of young people but there are some old people, too. Security guards patrol the area. They reassure Philbey. You do feel safer. Siobhan Best and her partner Jed see things a bit differently.
Yet there were niggles. With Jed working, Best got lonely. The local baby groups in Leyton and Stratford that I was attending closed down due to [a lack of] funding.
It was really weird how a new town had been plonked in such a run down area with such poverty, something seemed very odd about the whole place.
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