LATEST NEWS 2009 « Thread Started on Jan 14, 2009, 4:05pm »
The Associated Press Published: January 14, 2009
LONDON: London organizers secured another domestic sponsor by signing up Adecco to hire the staff needed to run the 2012 Olympics.
The world's biggest staffing agency will be responsible for doubling the staff of the organizing committee (LOCOG) this year and for providing the temporary staff required to run the London Games.
Adecco beccomes a so-called "tier-two" sponsor, joining candy company Cadbury and financial services firm Deloitte in paying a minimum of 20 million pounds (US$35 million) to be associated with the Olympics.
"The quality of the people we hire will have a direct impact on the success of the games," London 2012 chairman Sebastian Coe said Wednesday. "2009 will see LOCOG go through a number of changes as we start to move from our planning phase to delivery phase."
Adecco was also a domestic sponsor at the 2000 Sydney Games and the 2006 Turin Winter Games.
« Last Edit: Jan 14, 2009, 4:05pm by Forum Manager »
Re: LATEST NEWS 2009 « Reply #1 on Jan 23, 2009, 10:25am »
USA EXCITED OVER GAMES!
The United States Olympic Committee (USOC) visited the offices of the London 2012 Organising Committee (LOCOG) this week for a series of updates on the 2012 Games.
The delegation saw first-hand the progress being made on the Olympic Park and heard about plans for a range of topics specifically related to athletes, including the way sport competition will run, Pre-Games Training Camps and transport.
They also visited the first completed venue for the Games, Weymouth and Portland, which will host Sailing.
The visit was organised by LOCOG's National Olympic Committe and National Paralympic Committee Relations team.
Leslie Gamez, Managing Director of International Games at USOC (pictured above, second from left), said: 'We are excited to see the activity and development that is occuring at the Olympic Park. The Olympic Village plan looks great and the close proximity to a large number of competition venues will make it extremely convenient for our athletes and coaches.
'They are going to love competing in the historic venues like Wembley and Wimbledon and for those who will have the opportunity to compete in the newer venues like BMX or Aquatics they will get to experience the new and modern London.
'From being in and around London and Weymouth and Portland, looking at venues and speaking with locals, we sense the their excitement about the coming Olympic and Paralympic Games.
'With less than four years until the Games, we are pleased to see the progress being made on all fronts - from the Organising Committee to the venues to the public works. We have a sense that these Games will be spectacular.'
LONDON (AP) -London 2012 organizers have been granted a loan from a European Union bank to help fund the construction of the Olympic Village.
The Olympic Delivery Authority is struggling to raise private-sector funding and will decide in the coming months whether to accept the 255 million pound ($373 million; ?284 million) loan from the European Investment Bank.
The loan could only be spent on building about 1,300 of the 3,000 housing units on the east London development that will be turned into affordable housing after the games.
"The European Investment Bank have long been identified as a potential funding source for the affordable housing elements of the Village as part of a private sector led banking consortium,'' the Olympic Delivery Agency said in a statement Friday. "This would be on commercial terms. The approval of this part of the funding is a positive step while talks draw to a conclusion.''
The EIB is backed by the 27 member governments of the EU and raises money by selling bonds.
In January, the British government dipped into the Olympic contingency fund to allocate an extra 326 million pounds for construction of the 1 billion pound athletes' village.
Negotiations are continuing with Australian developers Lend Lease and the banks to secure private investment for the wider Olympic Village development.
"We expect all talks to have concluded this summer and in the meantime construction work on the Village is making good progress and the project remains on track,'' the ODA said.
Despite the pressures, London organizers remain confident they will come within the overall 9.325 billion pound budget for venues, infrastructure and regeneration. The figure is more than double the original estimate.
Re: LATEST NEWS 2009 « Reply #4 on May 12, 2009, 9:29am »
LARGE PARTY TO START THE YEAR
Boris Johnson is planning a spectacular free New Year's Eve party for 80,000 Londoners in the Olympic stadium seven months before the Games begin.
A giant fireworks display will light up the East End and top music acts will play in the arena on 31 December 2011 to herald the beginning of Olympic year.
Plans for the event are taking shape as David Higgins, the Olympic Delivery Authority chief executive, becomes confident construction work will be completed in time to open the park to the public well before the Games.
City Hall stressed the Olympic party would not repeat the fiasco of the East End's last big New Year's Eve bash, at the Millennium Dome in 1999, when massed ranks of VIPs attended and thousands of ticketholders were forced to queue outside.
Acts taking to the stage in the 80,000-capacity stadium may include Led Zeppelin guitarist Jimmy Page and Hackney-born Leona Lewis, in a reunion for the song Whole Lotta Love. They performed it at Beijing's Bird's Nest stadium last summer. Pyrotechnics are likely to be supplied by Chinese firm Panda Fireworks, the company which was hired for the Beijing opening ceremony and has been touting for repeat Olympic business in London.
The Mayor is keen to avoid a repeat of the Athens Games when the Olympic Park remained a building site until days before the opening ceremony.
The party would also allow officials to “stress-test” facilities before the Games, which will attract about 500,000 spectators a day. Dan Ritterband, City Hall director of marketing, said: “We've been looking at other host cities and their Olympic parks tend to turn into ghost towns afterwards because the first time they open to the public is just before the Games. We want to sell the park to Londoners.”
The New Year's Eve party is expected to be the first in a series of outdoor events in the park for the Cultural Olympiad, to celebrate the arts alongside the Games.
Re: LATEST NEWS 2009 « Reply #5 on Jun 5, 2009, 10:03am »
London 2012 athlete's village secures private funding
The London 2012 athlete’s village has secured a last-ditch private finance deal to fund the scheme, just over two weeks after it was announced the project would be fully funded by the taxpayer.
NCE’s sister title Infrastructure Journal (IJ) reports that Barclays and the European Investment Bank (EIB) are on the verge of closing a £500M project for the construction of the London 2012 Olympic village and its eventual transformation into social and affordable housing.
The transaction - which started off life as a property development deal with the private sector taking property risk and involving an element of social housing - is set to close within the next week and has been transformed from a design build contract with Lend Lease to a model that has been described by a source familiar with the project as “a new kind of PPP”.
A private sector deal from Lend Lease and its banking consortium was rejected by ministers in May as it was “not in the best interests of the taxpayer”. Lend Lease and its banking consortium were prepared to invest up to £150M in equity, involving a return to Lend Lease, and £225M of bank debt to finance part of the construction and development costs.
However, since last summer the economic climate has worsened considerably, and Lend Lease required the public sector to carry an increased level of risk on the deal, which ministers rejected.
This left the funding of construction of the village to fall to the Olympic Delivery Authority, which was to invest £342M - £261M comes directly from the contingency fund while £63M - is from savings made elsewhere on the programme contingency fund to back the scheme.
It was also confirmed in May under the public sector package that agreement had been reached in principle that a further £268M would be invested into the Village through the pre-sale deal with Triathlon Homes (a joint venture of East Thames and Southern Housing Group and urban regeneration developer First Base) for the affordable housing element. This funding is separate to the Olympic budget and made up of grant from the Homes and Communities Agency (HCA) and lending from a private sector banking consortium on commercial terms.
The total cost of the village, including £147M of post games development costs, was confirmed as £1.1bn. This was to be funded as follows:
£650M of public investment £268M of funding for social housing However, IJ reports that the new £500M private finance deal will see EIB and Barclays provide the debt on a 50:50 basis, with the Triathlon Homes deal for the social housing portion remaining in place. Bovis Lend Lease will build the village on a design and build basis.
After the games, the London Olympic Village Urban Renewal scheme will see the Triathlon Homes JV convert the 1,380 athletes’ flats into social, intermediate and affordable housing.
The project will see the delivery of the following:
17,000 beds for athletes and officials during the Olympic Games 7,500 beds for the Paralympic Games 3,500 new homes to be delivered following the Games, with 30% affordable housing Over 10ha of open space, including public squares and five new parks
Re: LATEST NEWS 2009 « Reply #9 on Oct 16, 2009, 3:12pm »
The London Organising Committee of the Olympic Games and Paralympic Games (LOCOG) today unveiled the London 2012 Olympic pictograms, the visual representations of each Olympic sport which will be used in the run up to and during the Olympic Games in 2012. The 38 pictograms represent the sports and disciplines at the Games and will be used for signage, on tickets and on the field of play at Games-time, becoming an important ‘wayfinder’ tool for spectators.
The London 2012 pictograms were developed in consultation with each International Sporting Federation and have been designed to be vibrant and accurate depictions of each sporting discipline. They will come in two different formats – a silhouette version for standard use and a dynamic version inspired by the connectivity of the London Underground map, which will be used on merchandise, posters, sign posts and wayfinding materials.
London 2012 Chairman Sebastian Coe commented, “The pictograms will be a vital wayfinder for spectators at Games-time and will become recognisable come 2012, but by unveiling them now we have a fantastic opportunity to use them as a tool for people to find out more about the Olympic sports. Over the next three years, each sport has a golden opportunity to tell its story and educate the British public about what it is on offer at London 2012. I hope the pictograms will be the gateway to achieve this and we will work with all of the governing bodies to ensure that knowledge of all the Olympic sports increases between now and 2012.”
Olympics Minister, Tessa Jowell said, “These pictograms will be a simple way of helping people navigate London during the Games and a reference point for fans of the Olympic sports in the run up to and throughout the Games in 2012. They will, I’m sure, become an enduring image of London 2012.”
Mayor of London, Boris Johnson commented, "These are bold and dynamic images, which capture the energy and colour of the Games. Each sport is illustrated with graphic simplicity and the way it incorporates the iconic London Underground visual identity is genius. The designs will add to the pleasure of everyone attending, as well as helping them navigate the city whilst the Games are on."
British Olympic Association Chairman Lord Moynihan said, “In 2012 Olympic sports and athletes will have a unique opportunity to showcase themselves to the UK and the world and the pictograms will help do that. They look fantastic and I am confident that they will become a key visual icon of the London 2012 Olympic Games.”
IOC Coordination Commission Chairman Denis Oswald said, “The pictograms of an Olympic Games are a unique link between the host city and the sports involved. The London 2012 pictograms are a strong and dynamic representation of the 2012 sports and are instantly recognisable as part of London’s look. This is particularly true of the dynamic version, which draws its inspiration from the London underground map, forever linking these Games to this great city. The Olympic summer sports are delighted by these designs and I hope that they will not just help people to find their way to the events but will also encourage young people to try out different Olympic sports as we head towards 2012.”
Olympic Games pictograms were first used at the 1948 Games in London and have become a regular feature of the Olympic movement since the Tokyo Games in 1964. The pictograms will be featured on limited edition adidas t-shirts on sale from October 24 2009 to celebrate 1000 days to go until the Olympic Games. There will be a full set of Paralympic pictograms which will be launched later this year.
The London 2012 Olympic pictograms represent each of the sports and disciplines of the Olympic Games.
There are two formats for each pictogram - a silhouette and a 'dynamic' version.
The silhouette pictograms
The 'dynamic' pictograms
The dynamic format of the pictograms bring the representations to life. They will be used on merchandise, posters and sign-posts. They were inspired by the London Underground map.
The structure would be built at the Stratford, east London site and be funded by Lakshmi Mittal, Britain’s richest man.
One early design shows a 400ft construction that resembles a cross between a Native American totem pole and a pylon, reports suggested.
It is understood that five shortlisted artists, including the former Turner prize winner Anish Kapoor and Antony Gormley, the designer of the Angel of the North, are being considered by a panel to be commissioned for the work.
Despite the mayor previously pledging in his mayoral manifesto to crack down on tall buildings, describing London’s skyline as “precious”, sources say the project would be “stunning”.
A source close to Mr Johnson reportedly said: “He wants to build something quite stunning in its ambition, like the Eiffel Tower or the Statue of Liberty — a tribute to London that people will fall in love with.”
A friend Mr Mittal, 59, added: “He loves living in London and wants to give something back to the city.
“The Olympics are obviously a very important event and he wants to be able to contribute to a legacy project that people will be able to enjoy for many years to come.”
Critics, however, said the project was likely to be compared with the “wedding cake” that Mussolini completed in Rome or the 250ft gold statue that was commissioned by Saparmurat Niyazov, a former Turkmen dictator, to rotate to face the sun.
Brian Sewell, the art critic, Britain was already “littered with public art of absolutely no merit”.
“We are entering a new period of fascist gigantism. These are monuments to egos and you couldn't find a more monumental ego than Boris.”
A spokesman for Mr Johnson told the Sunday Times: “The mayor is keen to see stunning, ambitious, world-class art in the Olympic Park and has been working with the Olympic Delivery Authority over many months to explore a series of commissioning projects.
“He is also in touch with prominent figures in the art establishment and philanthropists about taking these forward and getting private backing.
“This work is at an early stage and details will be announced when the projects are confirmed.”
The winning sculpture is likely to be announced within the next fortnight.
The Olympic Delivery Authority (ODA) has today released new aerial images of construction work on the Olympic Park showing the ‘big build’ firmly on track as the project enters its toughest year.
The images show the east London skyline being transformed by construction progress on the ‘big five’ venues – the Olympic Stadium, Aquatics Centre, Olympic Village, Velodrome and International Broadcast Centre/Main Press Centre (IBC/MPC). The images have been released as the International Olympic Committee’s Coordination Commission visits the capital for a progress update on London’s plans for staging the 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games.
ODA Chairman John Armitt, said: 'With construction work on the Olympic Park approaching its peak, the "big five" venues are already becoming landmarks on the east London skyline and show how much progress has been made since the IOC Coordination Commission visited earlier this year.
'The external structure of the Olympic Stadium has been finished and the completion of the Aquatics Centre roof gives us an exciting glimpse of what will become the "gateway to the Games" and the Olympic Park’s most iconic venue. Work is also racing ahead in the north of the Park with the first residential plot of the Village structurally complete, the huge frame of the IBC/MPC in place and the striking architecture of the Velodrome taking shape.
'The Olympic Park "big build" is firmly on track but we are not complacent and these new images show the sheer scale of the project and the challenges ahead as we enter our toughest year in the project.'
Sebastian Coe, Chairman of the London 2012 Organising Committee, said: 'In a little under 1,000 days time, the eyes of the world will fall upon this part of east London. The area is being transformed, creating new communities, new housing, and state-of-the-art sporting facilities.
'It is abundantly clear from these photographs that this piece of regeneration is well under way. Over the next year or so, we look forward to seeing the ODA continuing its excellent work so far and seeing the Olympic Park come to life – both for the Olympic Games and Paralympic Games in 2012 but also for generations to come.'
Olympics Minister Tessa Jowell said: 'The Olympic Park has really started to take shape since the IOC Co-ordination Commission’s last visit with several of the key elements of the build now complete and venues like the Olympic Stadium and Aquatics Centre making a real impact on the London skyline.
'I am confident that we have the measures in place to make sure that this good progress continues, as we head into the most intensive and challenging phase of construction.'
The images released today show how much the Olympic Park has changed since the IOC Coordination Commission visited London in April this year. A new fly-through video of the Olympic Park, narrated by Jonathan Edwards, was also released on the London 2012 website today. The video and latest aerial shots, taken earlier this month, show:
=The Olympic Stadium’s external structure completed with work starting on the lifting of the cable-net roof
=All five new bridges around the Stadium island lifted into place and the first trees planted
=The wave-shaped Aquatics Centre steel roof structure weighing more than 3,000 tonnes lifted and lowered into place, along with the completion of the concrete dive pool and work well underway on the two 50m competition and training pools
=The huge steel frame of International Broadcast Centre (IBC) completed and the Main Press Centre (MPC) coming out of the ground
=The steelwork forming the distinct double-curved structure of the Velodrome approaching the halfway point
=The first residential block in the Olympic Village structurally complete and work well underway on all other residential plots
=The foundations of the Handball Arena nearing completion
=The Energy Centre taking shape and the Primary Substation building finished – the first building on the Park to be completed
=Work well underway on 21 of more than 30 new bridges to be built in the Park.
Olympic Park
Athlete's Village
Aquatic Centre
Handball Arena
Energy Centre
Velodrome
Velodrome
Olympic Stadium
Athlete's Village
Olympic Park (looking north)
Olympic Park (looking south)
Olympic Stadium
Aquatics Centre & Olympic Stadium
Olympic Stadium
« Last Edit: Nov 23, 2009, 2:34pm by Forum Manager »
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