According to the organizers of the 2012 Olympics in London, 55,000 stadium seats from their new 80,000-seat Olympic arena could be dismounted and recycled for future Olympic events.
For sale: One Olympic stadium.
No, this isn’t one of those crazy deals you can find on eBay alongside a slice of Virgin Mary toast or the ghost of a stranger’s dearly departed grandpa - just imagine the shipping costs.
Nonetheless, it’s still a pretty amazing offer: According to the organizers of the 2012 Olympics in London, 55,000 stadium seats from their new 80,000-seat Olympic arena could be dismounted and recycled for future Olympic events.
Though the site of the 2016 Olympics hasn’t been selected yet, Chicago is an early favorite – and the city seems excited about the possibility of taking on London’s cast-off seats. “If we could box it up and ship it to the next games, that’s something that could benefit the Olympic movement,” Doug Arnott, one of Chicago’s Olympics organizers, told The Guardian. “This is to do with the responsible use of materials and trying to avoid leaving infrastructure that will burden a city.”
The Olympics may never be a completely green event, but by reusing the stadium’s materials, the cost and burden to both the city and the earth could be lowered dramatically.
“Chicago think this would be a coup for their bid, and would show they are putting their money where their mouth is on their commitment to sustainability,” an unnamed source told The Guardian.
Hand-me-downs never seemed so cool.