Sochi - Russian President Vladimir Putin and British Prime Minister David Cameron toured Sochi Olympic sites after negotiations in the Bocharov Ruchei residence.
They had a helicopter tour over the highland cluster, flew over the Imeretinskaya Valley and visited the Fisht central stadium designed and built with the assistance of British companies.
Putin and Cameron spoke to Damon Lavelle, the project’s chief architect from the British Populous bureau.
The Fisht is situated in the Olympic Park. Viewers will see mountain tops in the north and the sea in the south. The stadium roof will be made of a durable translucent material used in many arenas. The stadium will resemble a rock and blend into the mountainous panorama of the Imeretinskaya Valley.
The 40,000-seat stadium was named after Fisht (which means a white head or gray-haired in the Adyghe language), a mount of more than 2,800 meters above the sea level crowned with a glacier. The architectural concept of the arena derived from the snow cap of the mount.
Fisht, the only arena in the Olympic Park not to host any Olympic events, will be the scene of the Games opening and closing ceremonies. After the Games it will host matches of the Russian national soccer team (it is built consistent with FIFA requirements for Soccer Cup matches of 2018) and be a training, concert and amusement facility.
The stadium was designed in strict compliance with the requirements of the International Paralympic Committee and best available techniques for providing accessible environment for people with disabilities.
The arena is due to be commissioned in November 2013 but Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Kozak said that might happen already in September. Before that builders will have to finish the aboveground part of the arena, to install a temporary shelter over the field and to perform other technological operations for the Games 2014 opening and closing ceremonies.
INGEOCOM, leader of the INGEOCOM, a leader of the consortium of INGEOCOM, Populous, Botta Management Group and Mosproyekt-4, designs and builds the stadium. The British bureau Populous is the author and designer of the stadium concept. Damon Lavelle, an Australian, supervises the project. He is an expert in the construction of such facilities and construction projects at large, among them O2 Arena in London and the main stadium of World Soccer Cup 2010 in South Africa.
Currently Lavelle supervises Populous projects in Russia and Eastern Europe. In addition to Fisht, he is in charge of the Kazan stadium to become the main arena of World University Games in July. Both stadiums will play hosts to matches of World Soccer cup 2018.
Russia and the UK agreed to cooperate in the Olympic project during President Vladimir Putin’s visit to London in August 2012 when London was the Olympic host city. Putin thanked British Prime Minister David Cameron for support after Friday negotiations. It was also agreed that Russian and British security services would cooperate in the provision of the Games’ security.
