Stadiums & Arenas of Canada, Part 3

[WhipperSnapper]

Why oh why did I click on that link.

I wonder how much she spends on security per year due to her adoring fans.

[elly63]

Originally Posted by northernlights99

this is pretty pathetic, someone has to take some responsibility for this fiasco :

What's your point?

[ScreamingViking]

Is there a reason (other than the timing of the tour relative to the seasons) that a concert like this couldn't be held outdoors in Montreal, in one of its great public spaces?

I think that would be fantastic.

[thurmas]

Just wondering but if they have to jackhammer out the cement technical ring around the stadium would that not possibly damage the structural integrity of the stadium itself? As I do remember in 1991 a 55 ton piece of the big O fell off forcing the Expos to finish the remainder of their season on the road.

[WhipperSnapper]

My understanding is the ring is like the keystone in an arch. They are going to have to build a ton of bracing to hold up the roof before Jack hammering the ring out. That should prevent collapse. It is Quebec though

[Djeffery]

Yeah, I imagine it will be a pretty painstaking, piecemeal process that they probably have to do between 2 ribs at a time and move around the stadium. Thus the presumed high cost.

[thurmas]

Yikes this reno project could get very ugly if that much is required for the technical ring removal.

[northernlights99]

That technical ring binds the ribs (arches) together. Without the concrete ring to hold the arches in place, the arches will fall. This is the ugly reality facing the Quebec government. Probably why they have been kicking the can down the street for years waiting and waiting to finally face this cold hard reality. If you look at the arches, they don't project upwards as in other stadiums like the Kingdome in Seattle did or the Superdome in New Orleans. Olympic Stadium has the arches bend downwards. It almost looks like the ends of the arches are parallel with the ground surface. Well it took 32 years for Toronto to finally renovate Rogers Center, it took 25 years and a roof deflation to force BC Place into a new Retractable Sunroof. So now Montreal faces a crucial question at its stadium's 50 year mark. Upgrade or tear it down. With that money they could tear down this structure and build a new baseball stadium to attract a new MLB franchise. At any rate, its not just the roof that needs work. They need to replace all 56,000 wooden seats as Toronto and Vancouver have done (the seats are original from the stadium's construction). They need to upgrade the speakers, the entire sound system, maybe add sound proofing, the lighting, the scoreboards, the washrooms, the concourses, the concession stands, new paint jobs, new signage. That alone could go north of $ 100 million. The advantage of a new concrete lid is you can hang a video screen from the center as BC Place has done. BC Place spent $ 535 million for renos including $ 365 million just for the Retractable roof alone. The entire BC Place Stadium was built in 1983 for just $ 126 million. My proposal is remove the current blue roof, do temporary upgrades to the seating and speakers and sound system to satisfy the promoter.
Have Taylor Swift perform here in September while the weather is still nice.
Have a Winter Classic hockey game with the stadium open air. Then make a decision on the building's long term future. This way you satisfy two objectives before a decision is made to tear down or keep the stadium. You satisfy the fans and boost the economy by having Swift here, even if just one or two shows. And you can play the Winter Classic game in Olympic Stadium and satisfy hockey fans that at least it happened once in Montreal. At least you can add it to the history books. Folks, look at that roof. I posted 2 pics earlier. Don't kid yourself. Cost aside, with the amount of Structural support you will need to prevent the arches from collapsing, to fix that roof will take 3 years. Just remove the blue roof now, make it open air, bring in Taylor Swift in the fall, have the Outdoor hockey game towards end of 2024, then make the big decision later.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by northernlights99

That technical ring binds the ribs (arches) together. Without the concrete ring to hold the arches in place, the arches will fall. This is the ugly reality facing the quebec government. Probably why they have been kicking the can down the street for years waiting and waiting to finally face this cold hard reality. If you look at the arches, they don't project upwards as in other stadiums like the Kingdome in Seattle did or the Superdome in New Orleans. Olympic Stadium has the arches bend downwards. It almost looks like the ends of the arches are parallel with the ground surface. Well it took 32 years for Toronto to finally renovate Rogers Center, it took 25 years and a roof deflation to force BC Place into a new Retractable Sunroof. So now Montreal faces a crucial question at its stadium's 50 year mark. Upgrade or tear it down. With that money they could tear down this structure and build a new baseball stadium to attract a new MLB franchise. At any rate, its not just the roof that needs work. They need to replace all 56,000 wooden seats (all seats are original from 1975) as Toronto and Vancouver have done, they need to upgrade the speakers, the sound system, the lighting, the scoreboards, the washrooms, the concourses, the concession stands, new paint jobs, new signage. That alone could go north of $ 100 million. The advantage of a new concrete lid is you can hang a video screen from the center as BC Place has done. BC Place spent $ 535 million for renos including $ 365 million just for the Retractable roof alone. The entire BC Place Stadium was built in 1983 for just $ 126 million. My proposal is remove the current blue roof, do temporary upgrades to the seating and speakers and sound system to satisfy the promoter. Have Taylor Swift perform here in September while the weather is still nice.
Have a Winter Classic hockey game with the stadium open air. Then make a decision on the building's long term future. This way you satisfy two objectives before a decision is made to tear down or keep the stadium. You satisfy the fans and boost the economy by having Swift here, even if just one or two shows. And you can play the Winter Classic game in Olympic Stadium and satisfy hockey fans that at least it happened once in Montreal. At least you can add it to the history books. Folks, look at that roof. I posted 2 pics earlier. Don't kid yourself. Cost aside, with the amount of Structural support you will need to prevent the arches from collapsing, to fix that roof will take 3 years. Just remove the blue roof now, make it open air, bring in Swift in the fall, have the Outdoor hockey game towards end of 2024, then make the big decision later.

Minor quibble. Olympic Stadium's seats are all plastic. Yes they are the originals from when it was built.

[elly63]

Originally Posted by northernlights99

Upgrade or tear it down. With that money they could tear down this structure and build a new baseball stadium to attract a new MLB franchise.

You do know how much it is likely to cost to tear down and that it can't be blown up?

[northernlights9]

True, they can't do an Implosion cause the Metro tunnels run underneath and the tunnels would cave in.

So if they opt to tear it down, they will have to do it with wrecking ball. That is where the cost escalates.

If they decide to keep the stadium, there are two basic options.

First the technical ring has to be Replaced or Reinforced, nothing will happen before this is fixed as that is critical to keeping the current overhang structurally sound.

1. Replace the current blue roof. That would be cheaper.

2. A new Steel roof built above the current one.

I say "above" as the current roof must be at its load limit.

When the stadium was designed, the opening was suited to a fabric retractable covering hanging from the Incline tower.

Even as is with the blue roof, it is held up by cables from the Incline tower to take load off the current roof.

I don't think the current overhang has enough load strength for a steel roof to be placed over that opening. That would add considerable weight to the arches.

So a separate structure would have to be built outside the stadium. An arch structure that covers the entire width of the stadium. And several arches.

They could be curved arches like AT&T Stadium in Dallas or just flat beams. Then the roof plates over those beams.

The current roof is 170 feet above the playing field so the new roof structure would probably clear it by 30 feet.

I just can't see a steel top over the current arch system, even with the technical ring reinforced.

So it would be a roof over a roof. That is just my guess.

But I don't believe the stadium will re open again until the technical ring is reinforced, the roof is not up to current codes as has been mentioned in the media reports.

[elly63]

What happened to northernlights99.

[elly63]

• Video Link

[elly63]

Interesting explanation of the roof fabric issues (Start at 12:30)

[northernlights9]

I found this :

Finally, contrary to what has been reported in the media, the stability of the Olympic Stadium does not rest on the technical ring, but rather on the 34 consoles that make up the building. What’s more, the consoles support only 30% of the total weight of the current roof, the remaining 70% being borne by the Olympic Stadium mast. All this information is easily accessible at parcolympique.qc.ca/toiture.“

[elly63]

Originally Posted by northernlights9

All this information is easily accessible at parcolympique.qc.ca/toiture.“

Most of this information has been posted here at one time or another and been argued about for over 15 years. There isn't much new under the sun on this subject unless it regards the future.

[northernlights9]

Replacing the roof with another like this is Not an option, when I see this I don't blame Taylor Swift for passing on us :

[thurmas]

Will Quebec use a Vape tax to pay for the roof renos that might reach close to $ 1 billion since they used cigarette tax last time for the construction? Seriously though Quebec is damned if they do damned if they don't and with it getting close to being a public safety issue it will have to be renovated soon with it getting close to its 50th birthday.

[WhipperSnapper]

Originally Posted by elly63

You do know how much it is likely to cost to tear down and that it can't be blown up?

The $750 million price tag to tear down the stadium makes no sense and implosion peaked decades ago. It's not cheaper. Why is the cost to demolish 5 times more than any other stadium demolished?

[elly63]

Originally Posted by WhipperSnapper

The $750 million price tag to tear down the stadium makes no sense and implosion peaked decades ago. It's not cheaper. Why is the cost to demolish 5 times more than any other stadium demolished?

Why does it make no sense? In the video above the price was quoted at $500 million, still a substantial chunk of change. They say there's one thousand km of steel cable running through the blocks holding the thing together and I assume making it harder to break up.

I'm not a construction engineer but it's not hard to see that the work that will go into breaking that structure into small pieces and trucking it away (add the high cost of fuel) is not going to be cheap.