Tokyo 2020 Scraps Olympic Stadium Plan -- On the Scene

(ATR) Much to the "extreme disappointment" of World Rugby, the search is on for a new stadium for the 2020 Olympics and Paralympics.

Plans to build a $2 billion stadium to host the 2020 Olympics, as well as the Rugby World Cup the year before, were scrapped Friday by order of Japan Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. The $2 billion figure, when revealed a few weeks ago, provoked a storm of criticism, not only for the cost, but also the design for the 80,000-seat arena, the latest Olympic commission for noted London architect Zaha Hadid.

"I decided to discard the current plan of the new National Stadium, and the new plan is to be reviewed as zero-based," Abe said, signaling that cost will be a major concern for the design which is approved.

"The Olympic is the celebration of all of the people. The Olympic games must be a tournament to be blessed," he said about the public concern about the costs and the impact it might have on the enthusiasm of the Japanese public about the Olympics.

Abe told reporters in Tokyo Friday that he had been studying what to do about the stadium for the past month.

The decision to drop the Stadium plans comes five years before the 2020 Olympics but four years prior to the Rugby World Cup. To reduce the pressure on the construction timetable, Abe says the new National Stadium will not be available in time for the rugby event the year before. Organizers of the tournament will now have to find an existing arena to hold the finals of the tournament in 2019.

"It is said that we must hurry for the 2019 Rugby World Cup. If we do not want to do it in the new stadium, we do not have to do it," says Tokyo 2020 president Yoshiro Mori, who will lead the review panel for the revised stadium plans. He admits it’s not the best situation for rugby.

"If rebuilding is not in time, the Rugby World Cup should be held in other stadiums," says Ando.

A spokesperson for World Rugby said the federation is "extremely disappointed" and had received "repeated assurances" from Tokyo 2020 that the stadium would be ready.

"The National Stadium was a compelling and important pillar of Japan’s successful bid to host Rugby World Cup 2019, which was awarded to the Japan Rugby Football Union in 2009," said a statement.

"World Rugby is urgently seeking further detailed clarification from the Japan Rugby 2019 Organizing Committee and will need to consider the options relating to the impact of today’s announcement."

The Rugby World Cup has a recent history of utilizing fallback plans, having relocated matches in 2011 after the Christchurch earthquake in New Zealand.

Mori says he will accept the decision of the Prime Minister. There is no word yet on whether Mori has consulted with the IOC about this big change in plans.

So far, the IOC has not expressed any alarm about the delay in moving forward with the stadium project. But last month, IOC Coordination Commission chair John Coates did urge government leaders to come to terms quickly on how they wanted to resolve the stadium issue.

The bid for the 2020 Olympics from Tokyo included plans for a new stadium to replace the one used for the 1964 Summer Games. In the bid book, the new arena was budgeted at about $1 billion. Since that figure was set, the costs of construction in Japan for materials and labor have soared, due in part to the rebuilding after the 2011 earthquake and tsunami.

In a poll by Japanese broadcaster NHK this week, 81 percent of respondents said they were "not convinced" the new $2 billion plan for the stadium was feasible.

The Japanese prime minister has seen lagging approval of late with his cabinet's support dropping to 39 percent, according to an Asahi Shimbun poll. His position on the stadium isssue is seen by some as an effort to get back into the public's good graces.

Mori said to a Japanese TV program on Friday that the original stadium design was "disgusting."

"It looks like raw oysters. I hate the two huge arches. These do not fit Tokyo."

Reported by Hironori Hashimoto and Shusuke Hirata fromTokyo

Written by EdHula

Homepage photo: Getty Images