Sports complexes including athletics, swiming, cycling, gymnastics, tennis, basketball, hockey and other large enclosures.
These structures will often involve tensioned membrane roof panels, large span trusses, arches, cablenets or other forms of lightweight structures.
The following articles are in random order:
Chepauk Stadium, Stage One - India
This project was ambitious from the beginning; a large scale elevated cover over three grandstand seating structures presented a few structural challenges.
The purpose as with many tensile membrane projects was a combination of shade and weather cover. Each seating section required these basic needs met while maintaining a uniform style and aesthetic appeal through out. Our client, The Tamil Nadu Cricket Association, requested minimal connections to the supporting grandstand structure, leaving more space beneath for spectator seating.
The project was designed to create a unique feature to the venue. Often large scale tension membrane roofing contribute a large amount to the look and feel of a venue, it’s a prominent feature and one that needs to be eye-catching and unique.
Abdullah bin Khalifa (Lakhwiya Stadium)
Entrant: Tensys Engineers Pty Ltd
- Category: 4 ID Number: 6515
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Location: Doha, Qatar
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Client: Lakhwiya Sports Club
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Completion Date: February 2013
Credits:
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Architect: Perkins Eastman (USA), ECG (Egypt)
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Structural Engineer: Tensys Engineers
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Builder: Al Khayyat Development
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Fabricator: Hardco
APPLICATION OF PROJECT:
The development is to create a new stadium for the local Qatar League team ‘Lakhwiya’. The works involve creating a 15,000 seat stadium with 4 grand stand sun shading roof.
Structural Design of the Arch and Roof of Wembley Stadium
Kourosh Kayvani, PhD, FIEAust, CPEng
Aurecon, Sydney, Australia
ROOF DESCRIPTION
The aim of the new Wembley Stadium was to design and build a state-of-the-art national stadium, unlike any other in the world. The new stadium, with its elegant exposed steel structure arch, is an international icon as was the old stadium with its twin towers which was built in 1923.
The design brief required the roof not to cover the playing field which lead to one unique aspect of the roof in that it partially retracts over the seats to allow the daylight to reach all points of the pitch and thus a shadow-free playing field.
The retractable roof is formed by seven separate independently driven roof panels totalling 15,000 sqm that move in a parallel motion to the south as they "open" and stack on the top of one another when in a fully "open" position.
With the retracting roof panels all moving to the south, the roof design exploits the opportunity to have a tall, structurally efficient structure on the north side to support the north and south roofs. The solution was to have an elegant and structurally efficient arch which spans the entire width of the stadium's seating bowl (Figure 1).
Email for complete paper.
AAMI Park Stadium Melbourne
APPLICATION OF PROJECT
AAMI Park is Melbourne’s first purpose built venue for football (soccer), rugby league and rugby union. The 30,000-plus seat stadium offers a world class arena and playing surface for all three codes with an unparalleled spectator experience in terms of sightlines, atmosphere and amenity
PROJECT DESCRIPTION
AAMI Park, with its iconic bio-frame roof, fills a gap in Melbourne’s renowned suite of sporting facilities and increases the city’s ability to attract national and international events.
Home to the Victory, Hearts, Storm, Rebels and Melbourne Football Club teams, the stadium also features a sports medicine centre, elite training facility and administration complex, making it a true sports campus for Melbourne.
AAMI Park provides a strong foundation for football and the league and union codes to develop their fan base, and cements Melbourne’s claim as Australia’s – if not the world’s – sporting capital.
AAMI Park’s world class playing pitch and outstanding player facilities make it one of the best grounds to play on. In fact, AAMI Park is one of the few stadiums in the world to house four different sporting codes.
The Adelaide Oval is a world class cricket facility that was the focus of a $535 million redevelopment completed in 2014.
The first Test of the 2018-19 season between India and Australia was played at the Adelaide Oval. Congratulations to India for the win but it does seem as though the Aussies have a bit of fight in them. Onto the new stadium in Perth!
Various LSAA Members have been involved in the new roof structures at Adelaide. See this article for example.
Photo Credits: Peter Kneen
Many stadiums around the world now require special roof structures which utilize the principles we look for in a lightweight structure.
Some recent stadium structures are shown below:
The Optus Stadium is the brand new 60,000 seat sports stadium in Perth.
Two of the LSAA member companies - Arup and MakMax - have been involved in the design and construction of the roof structure.
The Arup design team attended the cracking one day cricket game between Australia and England for the first major event at Optus Stadium. The feature of the stadium is the lightweight cantilevering roof that has a clean fabric membrane soffit and those huge speakers pack a punch. Unfortunately we lost the day only by a few runs but the atmosphere was great.
Read more: LSAA Members at the First ODI at the New Optus Stadium
Adelaide Oval Western Grandstand Redevelopment
APPLICATION OF PROJECT: Structural design of lightweight diagrid grandstand roof
PROJECT DESCRIPTION
The Adelaide Oval Western Grandstand Redevelopment comprises the partial demolition and reconstruction of the existing heritage listed western members grandstand into a new A$116m 14,000 seat grandstand. The iconic grandstand was opened for the 2010 Ashes Second Test Match to rave reviews. The diagrid roof forms the centrepiece of the new grandstand achieving structural spans up to 55m with arched 219CHS sections leading to an elegant and exceptionally light (55kg/m2) roof solution to provide the required cover to the grandstand patrons with unobstructed views and designed to withstand 180kph design wind speeds.
Early in the design the impact of the steel fabrication, erection and site tolerances were identified as of critical importance to the successful implementation of the diagrid roof design. To accommodate this the Steel Subcontractor was invited into the design team early at 50% completion to workshop with Aurecon, the Architects, Managing Contractor and Client to provide the best for project solution and ensure that the final design was constructible within the required design brief, programme and cost plan. This early involvement allowed the design team to consider these parameters early in the process and has resulted in a very successful erection process and outstanding result for the Client.
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