Hot of the Press:
1. Beijing Municipal Planning Commission to Release First Round of Ownership Tenders on Stadiums in September
2. Olympic Park to Follow US Firm's Layout
3. Clean Air Drive Gets a Boost
Beijing Municipal Planning Commission to Release First Round of Ownership Tenders on Stadiums in September
The following information was sent to us by the Beijing Municipal Planning Commission:
The Beijing Municipal Government will adopt legal, policy and economic measures in organizing, guiding, coordinating and supervising the overall process of fund-raising and ownership tendering. Projects will be open to all investors and will focus on the following main projects:
- National Stadium
- National Indoor Stadium
- National Swimming Center
- Olympic Village
- Meeting and Exhibition Center
- Commerce Affiliated Facilities
The first group of Ownership Tenders will come out in mid September through the Beijing Development and Planning Commission (BDPC). Several teams are working at full speed to prepare and review the tender documents. Foreign consultants, e.g. for financial and legal assistance, have been appointed and are closely working with the Chinese side. There will be no "pre-qualification" and only one round is expected that will result in the selection of the "Owner" of the venue. The Owner will have ample room to seek a solution that best fits his goal of profitability.
We strongly recommend interested parties start looking into the setup of a "consortium" with the following main components:
A "financial team" capable of coming up with the funding and overall financial management; banks and other financial institutions are expected to be part of this group, along with investors;
A "technical team" that will deal with the detailed design of the venue, all technical consulting services, engineering and construction as well as most procurement; design and construction companies could be part of this group;
The "operator" of the venue who will have the particular skills to generate revenue throughout the concession period (30 years) and who will have the confidence of the investors.
The "Consortium" will have to demonstrate it has the management skills to deal with the overall coordination of all aspects as described above. Credibility and track record will be utmost important. The Municipality is well aware of the short time ahead and wishes to alert interested parties so they can prepare themselves. The BDPC is ready to have preliminary exchange of views with serious investors so both sides can clarify the parameters they can work with. As the major venues show a higher commercial risk, the Municipality is ready to start a dialogue and to listen to suggestions as to make the tender process a success both for the investor and the Municipality.
Please contact me for further clarification and any contact needed with BDPC.
Gilbert Van Kerckhove
Delegate - Investment Promotion
Beijing Municipal Development Planning Commission
Tel: (86) 10-6553-2151 or 6552-0764 Fax: 10-6553-2148
Mobile: (86) 136-0139-2009
gilbert.vankerckhove@lid.kviv.be
Olympic Park to Follow US Firm's Layout
(China Daily -Liu Li) 07/27/2002
Top officials with the Beijing Municipal City Planning Committee yesterday confirmed that the final layout of the Olympic Green will be based on the design by the United States architecture company Sasaki Associates. The US firm won first prize last week in the global design competition for the Beijing Olympics.
Shan Jixiang, who is director of the planning committee and responsible for planning the 2008 Olympic venues, yesterday addressed deputies to the Beijing Municipal People's Congress who were visiting the design exhibition at the Beijing International Convention Centre.
He told them: "An expert group from Beijing's major architectural design think-tanks, including the Beijing Urban Planning Institute, has begun to negotiate with Sasaki's partners to further improve the plan and incorporate the advantages of other prize-winning layouts."
The director of the planning committee's detailed-planning department, surnamed Zhang, said: "The traffic system of the winning plan still needs to be further improved to meet the requirements of the 1,135-hectare grounds and neighbouring districts."
Zhang, who did not want her full name to be used, said further research and negotiations are needed on the arrangement of bus and train stations.
Shan said that residents are now having their say on the designs of the Olympic Green and Wukesong Cultural and Sports Center, after experts voted for their favorites.
Due to the unexpected visitor flow, the planning committee has extended the ongoing exhibition at the convention center to Monday. The exhibition was originally scheduled to close yesterday.
Shan said: "Sasaki's layout got more than 20,000 votes for the ideal design for the Olympic Green by visitors to the exhibition, who had identical views with the jury."
He noted that visitors had filled several big notebooks with advice and opinions.
As for the Wukesong center, the planning committee is still comparing the winning plans and listening to stadium proprietors' ideas before making a final decision, according to Zhang.
"It is because we have to take every single stadium into consideration as it is a less comprehensive venue than the Olympic Green, which has not reached the stage of detailed design," Zhang explained.
At yesterday's discussion, Lan Tianzhu - director of the planning committee's Culture, Health and Sports Subcommittee - said he doubted the viability of the top-prize-winning plan, which has a water system covering more than 100 hectares.
"It will possibly become a stinking open ditch if there is insufficient water or if it becomes stagnant after the 2008 Olympic Games," Lan warned.
But Shan said: "Water is not a problem." He emphasized that the amount of water used by industry and agriculture in Beijing has decreased, and the volume assigned to environmental use is expected to reach 400 million cubic meters this year.
Clean Air Drive Gets a Boost
(Xin Bei) 7/29/2002
The application of higher emission standards is surely crucial to cleaning Beijing's air, but more efforts to improve traffic are also urgently needed to materialize its "Green Olympic" dream. Pollution-free air is in the interest of all, especially for Beijing, the host of the 2008 Olympic Games.
Fully aware of the difficulty to make its air clearer, Beijing has long tried to introduce higher emission standards. Now their push will bear fruit soon. Beijing will begin to apply the Euro 2 emission standards starting August 1. The new standards will bring about a sharp drop in the amount of main pollutants in vehicle emissions.
It is reported that, under the new standards, nitrogen and oxygen compounds from light-duty vehicles will be decreased about 55 per cent and particulates from heavy-duty ones will be reduced by 55 per cent in the near future.
Such good news will be readily welcomed by local residents who are increasingly vexed by the problem of air pollution. And it helps drive home the municipal government's resolution to fulfill its promise to deliver a "Green Olympics" in 2008.
However, besides automakers' enhanced emission-reducing capabilities, reasons behind the adoption of stricter emission standards also include worries over the foreseeable increase in the number of cars in this metropolis. As the country's entry into the World Trade Organization last year lowered car prices in the domestic market, the surging demand for cars will include a corresponding rise in vehicle emissions that Beijing can hardly bear. Harsh emission standards are a needed countermeasure, but it should also be remembered that lower speed resulting from heavy traffic could lead to more emissions and thus offset the efficacy of the new policy. Implementing an administrative rule like higher emission standards is one thing, comprehensively improving traffic is another. Less traffic jams, that can facilitate reduction of air pollution, is not only an obligation of the host city of the Olympic Games, but also a duty of the municipal government.
Admittedly, massive infrastructure construction and urban expansion makes traffic improvement very difficult.
But nothing is impossible to a willing heart, at least in this case. For instance, Beijing could take aggressive measures to encourage public transportation and better traffic direction.
Editor: David Snodgrass
INTERNATIONAL COPYRIGHT, U.S. COMMERCIAL SERVICE AND U.S. DEPARTMENT OF STATE, 2002. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED OUTSIDE OF THE UNITED STATES
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