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≡ 2032 OLYMPIC VENUES ≡
As had been predicted, the Queensland government proposed to build a new stadium in Victoria Park in Brisbane as the ceremonies and athletics venue for the 2032 Olympic Games.
Premier David Crisafulli, announcing the state government’s decisions after receiving a review of the venue questions on 8 March, announced (A$1 = $0.63 U.S.):
“The review thoroughly examined the options on the table. That work revealed the option of major works at the Gabba, to bring it up to standard, to befit the Queensland Games, just wasn’t possible.
“The experts advised that it could not be delivered in the time frame we inherited. There was no longer enough time to get that done. So it came down to a choice, of hosting the Games at QSAC [Queensland Sport and Athletics Centre] or at a new stadium at Victoria Park.
“It became a choice between spending billions on temporary facilities and temporary stands that delivered no legacy, or securing the future of AFL [Australian Football League] and cricket at a new home.
“It became a choice of delivering a Games with an eye to the future o rewinding the clock four decades. In the end, the choice was clear: the Games must be held at a new stadium, at Victoria Park.”
So the plan is now for:
● A new, centerpiece, 63,000-seat Olympic Stadium to be built in Victoria Park, originally estimated at A$3.4 billion and now at A$3.785 billion.
● The Centenary Pool Complex, opened in 1959, and at the corner of Victoria Park, will be revamped to become the national aquatics center, with permanent seating for 8,000 and Games seating for 25,000.
● The 54-acre RNA (Royal National Agricultural and Industrial Association of Queensland) Showground, also close to Victoria Park, will be the site of the Olympic Village and an upgraded, 20,000-seat main arena.
● The Queensland Tennis Centre will be upgraded with a 3,000-seat center court and 12 new match courts, and will host that sport during the 2032 Games.
● The previously planned 18,000-seat Brisbane Live arena, set to be a legacy showpiece from the Games, costing A$2.5 billion – mostly paid by the national government – is out of the program. Crisafulli said “The government’s decision not to proceed with the arena as part of the Games plan does not mean the death of the Brisbane arena, far from it. What it does mean is an opportunity to put the $2.5 billion the federal government has budgeted towards other infrastructure.”
He said another site in the Woolloongabba area will be used for the arena “and we will proceed immediately with a market-led proposal … for the fraction of cost to taxpayers.” The Gabba will eventually be torn down, after 2032.
● New rail lines and bus corridors will be built, with Crisafulli saying the plan is “fully funded,” but without all the details at the announcement. The original bid plan included an agreement between the national and Queensland governments for a shared A$7.1 billion in support.
● Outside of Brisbane proper, Barlow Park in Cairns – an athletics and football facility – will be upgraded with more seating, rowing will be on the Fitzroy River (already criticized for hosting crocodiles although Rowing Australia uses it regularly) and the Toowoomba Showgrounds will be renovated to become a permanent, national equestrian center.
Crisafulli ended by stating, “We’re not Paris, we’re not L.A. This will be better, and it’ll be the Queensland way, and that’s what will make the Games great.”
This is the latest chapter in a long and vitriolic road about stadiums and the 2032 Games, all having to do with Queensland politics:
● In the bid for the 2032 Games, awarded to Brisbane in 2021, the original plan was to renovate the famed Brisbane Cricket Ground (the Gabba) at a projected cost of A$2.7 billion. After then-Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk retired, her Labor successor, Steven Miles, undertook another review, which recommended a new facility – costing A$3.4 billion – at Victoria Park in Brisbane.
● Miles rejected both of cost concerns, in favor of renovating the existing Queensland Sport and Athletics Centre (QSAC) for track & field and using Suncorp Stadium (Lang Park) for ceremonies, all in the name of cost savings. Labor lost to the Liberal National Party (LNP), with Crisafulli as leader, in October 2024.
ABC News Australia noted in a Monday story previewing the announcement:
● “In an interview with ABC Radio Brisbane in March 2024, he said: ‘If you’re asking me whether or not I support a new stadium, the answer is no, and I’ve been clear about that.’”
● “On the election campaign trail in October, Mr Crisafulli also said: ‘We’ve said we’re not embarking on new stadiums.’”
Now he is.
Palaszczuk said in a January television interview, while the latest review was ongoing:
“The Gabba was the place. But I’ve been told that it’s already Victoria Park, and I think there’s going to be a lot of outrage about the last piece of pristine greenness in our city being ripped up for stadiums.”
Observed: Crisafulli has now rolled back one of the centerpieces of the International Olympic Committee’s Olympic Agenda 2020: to build as few venues as possible and use existing facilities. Instead, the Queensland government – like so many others before it – is using the Games as an excuse to build new infrastructure that it might not otherwise be able to get agreement on (not to mention funding).
IOC chief Thomas Bach (GER) has said that the IOC cannot stand in the way of local and national political decisions about future facilities if part of a long-term plan, which is how Crisafulli has characterized the new building program.
On the other hand, the Brisbane 2032 organizers are no doubt thrilled, as organizing committee President Andrew Liveris referred in a December interview with barely-concealed envy at the Paris 2024 main stadium:
“I mean, you just have to be in the Stade de France watching the sevens rugby, with 80,000 people providing revenue and top sponsors providing revenue, to understand the power of having a right-sized stadium for the Olympics.
“If a stadium like that appears at Victoria Park… [I] would say wow, what a great answer for the Olympics.”
He and his organizing committee are now at the mercy of the state and federal governments, and their contractors, to get the arenas, stadiums and village built on time.
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