Before the Games: the Construction Program

The year is 2373. In the seven years Nyhaven has to get ready for the Simlympics, it must make good on its promises of stunning new stadiums and a towering athletic village. Just a few months after the ISC's announcement and the subsequent groundbreaking ceremonies at Puget Island Athletics Park, much work has already been done on the new venues:



The foundations for the indoor arena that was already being built are now supporting its first girders. Across the street, a new soccer stadium is just getting underway.



The three biggest venues to be built are having their foundations laid to the south as we speak. Water pipes are already spreading under their future fields. Also, at right, another massive parking garage is being built.



Here's how the park looks in the spring of 2374; the scale of all this work should now be apparent. Another, indoor, soccer stadium is in progress at the northwest corner; meanwhile, near the southern entrance, the park's chapel is now open for athletes' spiritual needs. There is talk of putting the nearby stretch of railway into a trench, which would reduce the traffic backups that would otherwise happen during the Games as trains passed through.

So ends this first look at Simlympic construction. Keep coming back to see more progress as 2380 draws near!

In the fall, with the foundations finished, workers have begun raising the support structures for the future baseball stadium, arena and parking structure. Engineers remain uncertain of how to best route and lower the railway in this area; since it is a mainline, a temporary closure is out of the question. Also of concern is how close the trench can safely come to the park chapel. Due to the proximity of the park's rail station, a relatively tightly curved detour could be employed. It is also possible that two more tracks will be laid down to handle the expected increase in rail traffic.



As the main stadium and its neighboring soccer stadium start to rise above the ground, a new park information center and small parking garage are underway. This is a change from the park's master plan as it was shown in Nyhaven's bid; this was then to be the site of a much larger garage. However, with revised predictions of how spectators will come to the park, the garage was scaled down, freeing up the required room for this new building. The information center will also contain park administration offices and serve as the Simlympic media center, with several large conference rooms on the ground floor and office space allocated to visiting media outlets.



In 2375, shortly before the grand opening of Nyhaven's new observation tower (see update 12 of Nyhaven: an Engineer's View), this new rail transfer station opened its doors across the Beltway from the park. The Nyhaven Committee for the Olympic Games, or NyCOG, realized soon after the city was voted host city that visitors coming to the park by rail from the airport had to change trains a couple of miles north of the park, at Cathlamet Station, since the airport's spur joins the mainline north of the park's own station. The chosen solution was to build both this large station and a connection from the northbound airport spur to the southbound mainline and vice-versa. Now passengers can disembark here and take one of several light commuter-type trains to the park.



With the design of the athletes' village finalized, work could finally begin in early 2376. The first five of the planned 12 high-rise towers are under construction; their companion towers will break ground soon. The towers, when opened, will provide modest-sized living quarters for up to 18,000 athletes, coaches, and other staff members that are expected to arrive for the Games. Afterwards, these apartments will be offered at slightly reduced rates to lower- and middle-class families.