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The Tokyo Metropolitan Government announced the construction of the 2020 Olympic and Paralympic swimming venue, including the huge roof of the Olympic Aquatic Center, is under construction for the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games in Koto Ward, The Asahi Shimbun reported.
- The roof is 160 meters long, 130 meters wide, 10 meters thick, weighing six kilotons with steel frame construction, the news outlet reported.
- The center is four stories above the ground and one floor underground. Height is 37 meters.
- The completion of construction is scheduled to end in February.
Photo Courtesy: Tatsuya Shimada
According to the metropolitan government, the roof is constructed near the ground, in order to secure workers’ safety and reduce costs.
“In the future we will build three pools including the main pool,” former Japanese swimmer Hiroko Saito told The Asahi Shimbun. “It takes more time to process polluted soil inside the premises and the construction period has been extended for two months, but for the time being it has no impact on the competition.”
The organizers of the 2020 Olympic Games are working on venues for several sports, including swimming. All will remain in their planned Tokyo locations despite looming high costs. Earlier, swimming, canoe sprint and rowing had all been possibilities to move to existing venues outside of Tokyo.
the seating capacity for the aquatic center venue was cut from 20,000 to 15,000, saving some 14 billion yen ($125 million).
Sprint canoe and rowing will remain at the to-be-constructed Sea Forest venue, while volleyball may still be moved. The planned volleyball arena on Tokyo’s coast was projected to cost 40 billion yen ($360 million) to construct.
The Japanese government officials, Tokyo city officials, and the Tokyo organizing committee proposed a 2 trillion yen ($18 billion) cap on spending for the Games, but IOC vice president John Coates insisted that while his organization would not agree to that limit, he anticipated that costs would come in even lower.
