As the final countdown to the Rio 2016 Summer Olympics opening ceremony moves closer, the pressure to complete all the sporting and non-sporting venues is underway.
Rider Levett Bucknall (RLB) has been closely involved in the bidding, planning and delivery of Olympic Games and other major global sporting events for 20 years.
Baku 2015 European Games
Our recent successful involvement in the delivery of the inaugural European Games, held in Baku in 2015, was a collaboration of RLB offices globally.
Eighteen quantity surveyors, commercial, construction and project managers were deployed to Baku full-time.
Not only were the 21 venues delivered on budget, they were designed and delivered in less than three years.
London 2012 Olympic Games
For more than 5 years, RLB supported the London Organising Committee of the Olympic and Paralympic Games (LOCOG) in the procurement and delivery of temporary venues and overlay across 150 competition and non-competition venues at 120 sites, to the value of £650 million.
UK Partner David Higgins commented, ‘The complexities for an Olympic host city have always been significant, requiring resource commitment from the world’s leading major event management consultants over an extended period of time.’
He added, ‘Following the exhilaration of winning the right to host a major international sporting event, the reality of delivery dawns, and the hard work begins.’
Olympic agenda 2020
Recognising the challenges faced in the bidding process, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) have created the Olympic Agenda 2020. This includes strategies to streamline the bidding process and event delivery, with a roadmap for future sustainability and affordability for host cities.
Mr Higgins said ‘the IOC recognises the need to achieve value for money, and future Games will need to reduce time and cost in delivery.’
Finding cost-effective solutions
A measure of success for any major sporting event is avoiding the wasting of public money. Temporary venues and facilities can provide cost effective solutions, where a legacy plan does not provide for a permanent venue as part of a city’s long term strategic plans.
‘This was the case for London hosting the 2012 Olympics. The legacy drive resulted in more temporary venues being installed than the previous four Summer Olympic Games combined.
A significant opportunity to minimise Games’ costs is for venues to be temporary and to be re-locatable to the next successful host city,’ he concluded.
RLB’s Games track record
This includes the Sydney 2000, Athens 2004, Beijing 2008, London 2012, Rio 2016 Olympics, DOHA 2006 Asian Games, Melbourne 2006, Delhi 2010, Glasgow 2014, Gold Coast 2018 Commonwealth Games, and Baku 2015 European Games.
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