London 2012 Olympics: venue guide - Daily Telegraph
6) Venue: Greenwich Park
Location: In south-east London on the south bank of the river Thames.
Hosting: Equestrian- Jumping, Dressage, Eventing and Paralympic Equestrian. Also Modern Pentathlon.
Capacity: 23,000.
About: Existing venue, which is an enclosed royal park, with the Old Royal Naval College and the National Maritime Museum also within its grounds.
Fact: Henry VIII introduced deer to Greenwich Park in the 16th Century for him to be able to hunt them. He did not catch them all however, and some still remain in the park today.
Post Games: The temporary structures will be taken down and the park will return to the way it was.
7) Venue: Hadleigh Farm
Location: East of London in Essex
Hosting: Mountain Bike
Capacity: 3,000, not including standing around the course
About: It is a new, 550 acre venue, which is the alternative site to the original Weald County Park which was deemed not challenging enough.
Fact: Hadleigh Farm is owned by the Salvation Army
Post Games: The temporary structures will be taken down.
8) Venue: Handball Arena
Location: In the west of the Olympic Park
Hosting: Handball, Goalball, Modern Pentathlon.
Capacity: 7,000
About: New, permanent venue which will host the handball games up to the quarter-final, but the semis and the finals will be played in the larger Basketball Arena.
Fact: Rainwater collected from the venue’s roof will be used to flush lavatories and reduce water usage by 40%.
Post Games: It will be adapted to become a multi-use sports centre for the community to use, as well a training centre for athletes and a venue for small to medium sized competitions.
9) Venue: Hockey Centre
Location: Olympic Park
Hosting: Hockey, Paralympic 5-a-side Football, Paralympic 7-a-side Football.
Capacity: 15,000
About: New venue, composed of two pitches, the main pitch with a capacity of 15,000 and the second pitch with a capacity of 5,000.
Fact: The first Olympic Hockey final was played in 1908 in London, where England defeated Ireland 8-1.
Post Games: The hockey pitches will relocate to the north of the Olympic Park, joining a collection of facilities in a place known as Eton Manor.
10) Venue: Horse Guards Parade
Location: In Whitehall, in the heart of London next to Downing Street and Buckingham Palace
Hosting: Beach Volleyball
Capacity: 15,000
About: The venue will be new, however the Parade has a long history, hosting the Queen’s official birthday celebration each year with the Trooping of the Colour.
Fact: At the 1996 Olympics, The USA men's side were so good that they had two teams playing each other in the final.
Post Games: The temporary facility will be taken down.
11) Venue: Hyde Park
Location: In the West End of London
Hosting: Triathlon, 10k Open Water Swim.
Capacity: 3,000
About: Hyde Park is the largest of London’s Royal Parks and has been open to the public since 1637. The seating will be a new but temporary addition to the park.
Fact: Queen played a concert here in 1976 with an estimated audience of between 150-200,000 people turning up.
Post Games: The course and the grandstand will be removed.
12) Venue: Lee Valley White Water Centre
Location: 30km north of the Olympic Park
Hosting: Canoe Slalom
Capacity: Up to 12,000
About: The centre will be a new, permanent venue which is made up of two courses, one for training, one for competition.
Fact: 15 cubic metres of water per second will flow into the 300m competition course – enough to fill a 50m swimming pool every minute.
Post Games: The venue will remain a Canoe centre open to the public as well as elite athletes, but the temporary seats will all be removed.
13) Venue: Lord’s Cricket Ground
Location: North-west London near Regent’s Park
Hosting: Archery
Capacity: 6,500
About: Lord’s is an existing venue and in sporting terms, is the ‘home of cricket’ and has been since 1814, hosting international matches on a regular basis.
Fact: The ground slopes 8ft 8in from one square boundary to the other.
Post Games: The ground will go back to being home for the Marylebone Cricket Club and Middlesex County Cricket Club. Archery equipment from the Games will be given to schools across the country.
14) Venue: North Greenwich Arena
Location: Right at the point of the Greenwich peninsular in East London near Canary Wharf
Hosting: Artistic Gymnastics, Trampoline, Basketball, Wheelchair Basketball
Capacity: 20,000
About: The Arena (also known as the O2 Arena), is an existing venue which currently hosts hundreds of concerts a year as well as sporting events such as tennis. It is widely regarded as one of the best venues in the world, attracting the biggest names in entertainment.
Fact: If the Eiffel Tower was laid on its side, it would still fit inside the arena.
Post Games: It will remain an entertainments venue, attracting people from all over the world.
15) Venue: Olympic Stadium
Location: In the south of the Olympic Park
Hosting: Athletics, Paralympic Athletics
Capacity: 80,000
About: The Stadium is being built from scratch and aims to be constructed by next year. 55,000 of the 80,000 capacity is removable, which apparently has never been attempted before.
Fact: 10,000 tonnes of steel are being used to build the venue, compared to the 42,000 used by Beijing for their ‘Bird’s Nest’.
Post Games: Negotiations are still ongoing as to what exactly will happen to the Stadium, with various sporting clubs in London all expressing interest in using or leasing it.
16) Venue: Olympic Village
Location: In the Olympic Park
Hosting: All athletes and officials.
Capacity: 17,000
About: As well as residential apartments, the village will comprise of shops, restaurants, medical, media and leisure facilities. There will also be a ‘Plaza’, where athletes can meet up with friends and families.
Fact: The plan of the village has been based around London’s tradition of building homes around communal squares and courtyards.
Post Games: The village will become housing for new residents in east London, transforming into 2800 homes.
17) Venue: The Royal Artillery Barracks
Location: On the edge of Woolwich Common in south-east London.
Hosting: Shooting, Paralympic Shooting, Paralympic Archery
Capacity: 7,500
About: The artillery barracks were constructed in the 18th century and it only seems fitting that the shooting events take place here. Four temporary indoor ranges will be built for Pistol and Rifle shooting, with outdoor ranges for Trap and Skeet events.
Fact: Hungarian shooter Karoly Takac, taught himself to shoot left-handed after a grenade blew off his right arm in 1938. 10 years later, he won two gold medals at the London 1948 Games.
Post Games: There is still uncertainty as to where elements of the venue and sports equipment could be reused after the Games.
18) Venue: Velodrome
Location: In the North of the Olympic Park
Hosting: Track Cycling, BMX, Paralympic Track Cycling.
Capacity: 6000 in the Velodrome (permanent), 6000 at the BMX track (temporary)
About: Totally new venue with the velodrome having two tiers, with a glass window in between the tiers for a 360-degree view of the Olympic Park.
Fact: Sir Chris Hoy was involved in the design process of the Velodrome.
Post Games: The BMX seating will be removed and the track reconfigured. A new mountain bike course and road cycle circuit will be added to create one venue which will encompass all disciplines of the sport.
19) Venue: Wembley Arena
Location: Northwest London, 6 miles from the city centre.
Hosting: Badminton, Rhythmic Gymnastics
Capacity: 6,000
About: Wembley Arena is one of the most famous concert venues in the world and has been host to many of the biggest names in the music industry. It has also hosted sporting events such as boxing, ice hockey and darts, so very little preparation needs to be done for it to be ready.
Fact: Wembley Stadium was the primary venue the last time the Games were held in London, in 1948. Was built for the equivalent of the Commonwealth Games (The Empire Games) in 1934 by Sir Arthur Elvin, and originally was intended to be a swimming pool.
Post Games: It will return to being a world-class concert venue.
20) Venue: Weymouth and Portland
Location: In Dorset on England’s South Coast
Hosting: Sailing, Paralympic Sailing
Capacity: No seating at venue
About: Weymouth Bay and Portland Harbour provide some of the best natural sailing waters anywhere in the UK, along with facilities to match on land. It has already hosted the World Youth Championships which was attended by over 60 nations.
Fact: Great Britain has been the most successful sailing nation at the last three Olympics.
Post Games: The venue will be used predominantly by the National Sailing Academy after the Games, who will no doubt benefit from the improved facilities. Local community use will also be allowed.
21) Venue: All England Lawn Tennis Club
Location: Wimbledon
Hosting: Tennis
Capacity: 30,000
About: Wimbledon is the home of the All England Tennis and Croquet Club and is the setting for arguably the best tennis tournament in the world which takes place every summer. It is famous for being the only major grass-court venue in the world.
Fact: ‘Love’ – the term for ‘no points’ in tennis – is thought to come from the French word ‘l’oeuf’, meaning ‘egg’ – the shape of a zero.
Post Games: Wimbledon will go back to being host of the major tennis tournament.
22) Venue: Water Polo Arena
Location: Olympic Park
Hosting: Water polo
Capacity: 5,000
About: designed to complement the look of the Aquatics Centre, the wedge-shaped arena will rise from 12 metres to 25 metres and feature a rippling roof made of recycled PVC cushions inflated with air to provide extra insulation.
Fact: the Aquatics Centre and Water Polo Arena will be adjacent to each other in one of the most tightly-packed areas of the Olympic Park.
Post Games: the arena will be taken down, although it is expected that materials will be reused or recycled.
23) Venue: Eton Manor
Location: Olympic Park
Hosting: Wheelchair tennis
Capacity: 10,500
About: the formerly disused sports club will house nine competition courts and four warm-up courts, as well as temporary training pools – three 50m pools for swimmers, and smaller pools for synchronised swimmers and Water Polo players.
Fact: Eton Manor acted as a temporary base for the Construction College East London, a training centre for people hoping to work in construction. When the college moved to its permanent base in 2009, many students stayed on to work on the Olympic project.
Post Games: the site will serve as a sports centre for the local and regional communities and will include a tennis centre with four indoor and six outdoor courts, a hockey centre with two competition pitches and five-a-side football pitches. The site will be able to accommodate elite hockey events with up to 15,000 spectators.
24) Venue: Brands Hatch
Location: In Kent, one hour away from the Olympic Park
Hosting: Paralympic road cycling
Capacity: TBC
About: The internationally-renowned motor racing circuit plays host to many British and international racing events throughout the year. The Paralympic course, which passes through Sevenoaks, will start and finish at Brands Hatch.
Fact: The venue was originally a mushroom field, before its potential as a racing track was spotted by a group of cyclists in 1926. The track was used for 12 runnings of the British Grand Prix between 1964 and 1986.
Post Games: The track will revert to its role as one of Europe's leading motor racing venues.
Fine and dandy: London's men's fashion shows - The Guardian
The menswear industry used to be a little on the lean side Рthe Stan Laurel to womenswear's Oliver Hardy. The numbers were smaller but the sizes larger, and the places to find it few and far between. Step into a department store and you'd have to wade through armies of girls squirting Est̩e Lauder Happy to find the escalator that led you to all things manly; visit a fashion website and you'd hope there'd be a small tab tucked away on the side indicating that there might be a little for him as well as a lot for her.
Well, all that has changed. The menswear industry may never rival that of womenswear, but it's growing up mightily quick. So quickly, in fact, that the British Fashion Council has finally deemed it necessary for menswear to have its very own fashion week. London Collections: Men launches this June with a three-day festival of shows, parties, exhibitions, dinners and talks. The fact that London's menswear shows will now be on the fashion calendar alongside those of Milan and Paris is no mean feat and is the reason why both the mayoral office and HRH the Prince of Wales are lending their support – the latter is to celebrate the occasion with a party in the state apartments of St James's Palace.
This is no vanity exercise. In the past year or two, menswear sales have gained momentum across the world. In the States, a key territory for most British designers, last year men's clothing sales increased by 4% to $55.71bn. Department stores such as Selfridges and Harrods have invested unprecedented space in their menswear floors recently, and it's no coincidence that last year Net-a-Porter decided the time was right to launch a brother e-commerce site for its successful womenswear one. As editor-in-chief of mrporter.com, I was delighted to sit on the London Collections committee (our own bash on the Friday night will probably be a little racier than HRH's).
So why, with a wobbly economy, have the sales of men's fashion – especially at the luxury end – taken a turn for the better? First, Asia, and especially China, has proved to be a huge growing market, with a strong appetite for designer brands with clout and heritage – many of which are British. And in times of increased competitiveness in the workplace, most men realise the importance of looking smarter, stronger and fitter. Sales of tailored clothing jumped 26% in the 12 months to February, with a lot of vendors seeing a sharp rise in their made-to-measure business.
There's also the sense that when times are tough and news is bleak we seek comfort in the things that surround us. This spring, for example, retailers have seen surprisingly strong sales of brightly coloured shirts and trousers. Not long ago, you would never have imagined that our city centres would be populated by men happily sporting emerald-green trousers, pastel-pink patterned polos and dusty-blue suede brogues (step forward, Prince Harry).
The joy, and saving grace, of the British men's fashion industry is that it has so many facets: Savile Row, an institution whose traditions and aesthetics are copied the world over; a shoe industry in Northampton that boasts unparalleled levels of craftsmanship and expertise; and a neverending supply of talented and innovative young designers emerging from the country's leading fashion colleges. All these and more will be celebrated in London as the ideas, talent, polish and skills of the British menswear industry are paraded in front of an international audience – not just those seated at the events, but also those eagerly watching on Twitter, Facebook, street-style blogs and magazine websites.
And not only have the country's leading style makers, magazine editors and industry leaders come together to support this venture, but so, too, has a host of fashion-conscious celebrities, including David Walliams, Tinie Tempah, David Furnish, David Gandy and Downton Abbey's Dan Stevens.
If you're still wondering what all the fuss is about, take a look at some of the talent here that will be on display in June. British menswear is looking very fine and dandy indeed.
London Collections: Men runs from 15-17 June. For more information, go to londoncollections.co.uk
London 2012 Olympics: Fears grow of Olympic tube chaos - Independent
FEARS are growing over the ability of London’s tube network to cope during the Olympics after the system suffered another catastrophic morning.
Passengers on the Circle, District and Hammersmith and City lines faced lengthy delays after two separate signal failures.
Problems were also reported on the Northern and Bakerloo lines as the difficulties on the network, which saw disruption nearly every day last week, showed little sign of improvement.
“The scale of the daily tube delays we are seeing is completely unacceptable,” said Val Shawcross, Labour’s transport spokesman.
Millions of Londoners who use the tube everyday deserve better than the terrible services they are being forced to endure,” “Boris Johnson is chair of Transport for London – he needs to take responsibility and urgently get a grip of the problem."
The biggest concern surrounds the Jubilee Line, a key Olympic artery, linking several Games venues including Wembley and Stratford to central London at a time when unprecedented numbers are expected to use the network.
“The Jubilee line is crucial,” said Tim Bellenger of London Travelwatch. “When something goes wrong on the section between Westminster and Stratford there will be a ripple impact on the rest of the network.
“If it fails, people will migrate to the Central line, which will already be extremely busy.”
Last week a meltdown on the line saw passengers being taken off a train and walked through a tunnel to safety.
It was not an isolated incident. According to Transport for London’s own statistics, more than 500,000 “customer hours” were lost on the Jubilee line to track, train and signal failures last year.
The line performed far worse than any other line on the network, despite having a newer signalling system.
Other parts of the network, notably the circle and district line, relies on signalling which is at least 40 years old.
The latest problems intensify pressure on Peter Hendy, London’s transport commissioner, who earlier this year advised commuters to avoid delays by heading down to the pub until the problems cleared.
He was rewarded by being named “beer drinker of the year” by the all-party parliamentary beer drinkers group.
But Bob Crow, leader of the RMT transport union was unimpressed. “Instead of collecting gongs from the brewers, and making smug comments advising passengers to head for the pubs rather than the tube, Peter Hendy should be getting a grip on the chaos of breakdowns and failures that has engulfed the underground just weeks away from the Olympic Games,” he said.
“RMT warned that the cuts to jobs and maintenance would plunge the network into a crisis and those who ignored those warnings are now on the brink of turning London transport into a global laughing stock.
- David Millward
© Telegraph.co.uk
London 2012 providing boost to ‘Brand Britain’ - sportbusiness.com
A survey of 6,000 consumers by Deloitte, the official professional services provider to London 2012, found that around 80% of respondents from China and India are more likely to want to visit Britain in light of the publicity surrounding the Games. More than 60% say they would like to buy more British products, whilst 77% want to learn more about the UK as a whole. The research also shows that 76% of respondents in China and India associate the Olympic Games with the UK, a higher proportion than consumers elsewhere in Europe or the United States. Only the UK’s history, universities and London itself are attributes more closely associated with the UK in the minds of Chinese and Indian consumers.
“London 2012 clearly provides a direct and immediate opportunity for consumer businesses,” said Nigel Wixcey, UK head of consumer business at Deloitte. “However, our research shows the potential is there for a longer term benefit too, but only if companies are prepared to exploit the opportunity. As the global population is evolving, so consumer spending power is shifting. The emerging middle classes of China and India are increasingly powerful consumers of Western goods – both as visiting tourists and increasingly as strong consumer markets develop in their home countries. This trend will continue to accelerate over the next few years.”
Deloitte has noted that the impact of the publicity surrounding the Games has not been so pronounced in Europe and the US. However, despite this around half of consumers surveyed in France, Germany and the US said they are more interested in visiting Britain as a result of publicity surrounding the Games, whilst roughly a fifth would like to buy more British products.
Simon Oaten, director in the consumer business industry at Deloitte, added: “There has always been a strong underlying demand to visit Britain, but London 2012 is giving the UK a shot in the arm. Given the UK economy’s growth prospects, it is important for consumer businesses to develop relationships with overseas customers, particularly from markets such as India and China. Retailers and hospitality operators in the UK who understand the shifting global demographics will reap the rewards. London 2012 provides the UK with a unique moment, a unique competitive edge over other countries.”
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