Reimagining Stadiums
I like buildings. We spend most of our lives in them. Our homes, our offices, our favourite restaurants, our places of play and gathering - everything is a building. I also like sports. For the raw emotions it brings, for its power to unite people. So my favourite buildings are stadiums. I found them as emotional landmarks of a community, reflecting its shared spirit and identity. They are symbols of unity and pride, where people from all walks of life come together to celebrate triumphs, share sorrows, and forge lifelong memories. They inspire, uplift, and offer solace to people.
Beyond their emotional significance, as highly visible structures, stadiums hold the power to showcase what is possible when sustainability meets bold infrastructure. They can demonstrate how buildings can bring positive changes to people and the planet. I actually did a PhD on this. So, I can confidently say (according to data!), it’s possible. But, too often, stadiums are just soulless structures of concrete and steel. Isolated, resource-hungry monoliths. They are often white elephants for owners and of little use to local people.
Here, I would like to talk about two stadiums that raised my hope that meaningful change is not only possible, but already underway, when vision meets courage.
Eco Park: A stadium made of wood
Imagine an all-wooden stadium. That’s Eco Park - the future home of Forest Green Rovers (FGR). Designed by Zaha Hadid Architects, Eco Park is the first-ever stadium that is gonna be built entirely of wood. Powered completely by renewable energy from the wind and sun, Eco Park is set to become the world’s lowest-carbon stadium. The stadium will seamlessly blend into its surroundings with a transparent roof and facades, which fill the stadium space with natural lighting. There will be no shadows or pillars that obstruct the views of fans or players. The site will also include office and industrial spaces for green businesses. Eco Park redefines what’s possible in stadium design, building on FGR’s reputation as the greenest football team in the world with its full vegan menu, organic pitch, and kits made from recycled plastic. Beyond the inspiring design, this is also about Dale Vince, the man behind the vision, who stood firm on his convictions through years of delays and resistance. After receiving initial permission for the 5000-seat stadium in 2019, he and his team have continued to push forward, holding fast to a future where sports, fun, business, community and nature thrive together.
Sources: ecopark.com
Galatasaray AŞ Nef Stadium: A stadium that turned its roof into a solar field
Nef Stadium in Istanbul (financed by Enerjisa Enerji) is equipped with over 10,404 solar panels on its roof and can generate 4.2 MW of energy. It holds the Guinness World Record for the “most powerful solar power output from a sports stadium”. To put that into perspective, Nef generates energy equivalent to the energy consumption of 2000 homes, and reduces around 3250 tons of carbon dioxide emissions every year. That’s the same as what 200,000 trees can do in 25 years. From the financial side of things, 63% of the electricity costs of the stadium are covered by the solar. An incredible example of how ambition, innovation and bold partnerships in sports can be transformed into powerful forces to fight against climate change, all while uniting and influencing thousands of people under one roof.
Sources: Most powerful solar-powered stadium | Guinness World Records, PR Newswire, Energy Terminal
Meanwhile, in Australia…
Meanwhile, here in Australia, we seem to have mastered the incredibly useless art of indecision. We go back and forth arguing over whether to build a new stadium, renovate an old one, or construct another one in one of the last remaining culturally and environmentally sensitive green spaces in our city. Then we debate over which part of this precious area we are willing to sacrifice, how we might connect them to transport links, what type of construction techniques we should use in this potentially flood prone, hilly terrain and what kind of acoustic and aesthtic materials might reduce the impacts of noise, light and traffic on the nearby children and women’s hospital and how to build an entertainment percinct nearby, all while trying to keep the rich history and heritage alive.
While we proudly pat ourselves on the back for installing a handful of solar panels at an outrageous cost or for setting up a plant-based vending machine in one of our stadiums, there are people out there who are aiming higher, achieving more and making a real impact. Those bold transformations are only possible when people dare to believe in something bigger, challenge the status quo, and persist through the complex dynamics and conflicting interests of politics, money, and legislation.
Here, in the very country that pioneered the Green Games with Sydney 2000, we have the power to do something different - to design the majestic, build the lasting and maintain it with meaning. And if we get it right, we are creating something extraordinary: spaces that inspire, connect and heal. That, after all, is what stadiums have always been about, right? From the era of the Colosseum to today, stadiums make us feel something that is greater than ourselves.
Just like the Colosseum, the stadiums we built today will tell future generations what we stood for. How thoughtful and brilliant our minds were and how much care we took - for nature, for each other and for those yet to come. Let them be proud of their forebears.
