Better than London’s Olympic Park? Designers rave about new Kai Tak Sports Park
- Design firm Populous says HK$30 billion project sets a new benchmark in a ‘park for all’
- Sports, entertainment and community facilities are connected in an urban oasis
Setting the benchmark for multipurpose sports precincts, the HK$30 billion project was officially launched when Hong Kong Chief Executive Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor symbolically dug a golden shovel into the ground on the 28-hectare site.
The prized real estate on the old Kai Tak airport runway overlooking Victoria Harbour and Hong Kong Island will now be a hive of activity as the New World Development subsidiary, Kai Tak Sports Park Limited (KTSPL) races to complete the project not only on time by 2023, but within budget.
Global architecture and design firm Populous, a member of the KTSPL consortium, is confident it will deliver a “park for all” while setting a new world benchmark.
“There is nothing like this anywhere in the world, it’s unique,” said Paul Henry, Populous’ senior principal/managing director for Asia-Pacific.
“We have created a new benchmark in the world for sports, entertainment and community facilities that are connected in an urban oasis.”
Henry said Populous is the world’s leading designer of sports and entertainment facilities, with creations such as the London Olympic Park, Sydney Olympic Park, O2 Arena in London and more recently Tottenham Hotspur’s new stadium in London.
“We have been very lucky to design 3,000 projects around the world, we have never done one like this,” he said.
“The London Olympics is the benchmark. The park forced us to spread facilities out because of the crowds. Here, we had the chance to compress, to bring [everything] together.
“There is nothing like this in the range of facilities, from leisure, sport, retail, wellness, community. “What excites us is that we have gathered all the components and the best of Hong Kong into one design.
“We have created something different, rather than a single use venue of which there are so many in the world,” said Henry, adding that their goal was seven-day-a-week usage and engagement with communities and neighbourhoods.
“We believe this will be one of the most used facilities in the world in how it integrates with the surrounding area as well as the range of facilities,” he said.
The park will be built around a sports avenue, an indoor and outdoor pedestrian walkway that starts at Station Square – the connection to the park linking new MTR stops Kai Tak Station and Sung Wong Toi Station – and takes people all the way to the harbourfront. It also connects to other parts of the park such as Dining Cove.
“There is fantastic history on this site,” Henry said, referring to an 1800s connection point between Hong Kong Island and the mainland and more recently Kai Tak airport which served as an entry and exit point to Hong Kong for so many years. “The idea of the sports avenue is to pick up on those connections and take it one further where athletes can train here and then go to the world from this location.”
The 50,000-seat main stadium will feature an infinity edge design above the south stand, with a vast activity platform that looks out over Victoria Harbour.
The main stadium boasts one of the most “sophisticated” retractable roofs in the world, with the theme “Pearl of the Orient” as its design inspiration. It has a flexible pitch surface that can be switched between natural turf to other surfaces to host a range of international, regional and local events in any weather.
“It’s sophisticated, yet elegant and has an intelligent light system so it sparkles at night,” Henry said.
The park also includes a 10,000-seat indoor sports centre, a 5,000-seat public sports ground, and more than eight hectares of open spaces.
