New images show the 2016 Olympic Park centred itself around a trio of existing stadiums leftover from the 2007 Pan-American Games, which were constructed over a Formula One racetrack from the 1970s, with 15 sports venues dotted along a network of snaking pathways, as by master planners AECOM.
AECOM’s master plan for the project focuses on approximately 300 acres of land in the district of Barra de Tijuca, southwest of Rio. It includes three phases: the Rio Olympic Park area during the 2016 Games, a transition plan and the final position showcasing the site in legacy mode after 2016.
The plan’s first phase shows the 300-acre site, which will host 15 Olympic sports competitions and 11 Paralympic contests. The Media Center will also be constructed at the same location, which will host approximately 20,000 journalists.
The second phase illustrates how the site can operate during the transition stage — a 5- to 7-year period of time following the games when the site is not fully developed. This final phase comprises a legacy mode master plan that demonstrates economic, environmental and social sustainability development around the permanent structures and without the temporary structures.
The new permanent sports facilities will be concentrated around existing ones — the Maria Lenk Aquatic Center, Velodrome and HSBC Arena. After the games, these facilities will be renamed as the “Olympic Training Center” and be used to discover and develop new sporting talents. The Rio win coincides with a showcase of AECOM’s worldwide sports group which demonstrates AECOM’s enhanced capability in sporting projects.
The sports group draws together the expertise of the company’s international teams of economists, planners, engineers, architects, landscape architects, urban designers, cost consultants, project and program managers, construction managers, ecologists, hydrologists, archaeologists, transportation planners, management consultants and others.
“Anyone planning a sporting project or event — mega, large or small — anywhere around the world can call on our team and our unique collaborative way of working on a project from start to finish,” said Dionisio.