Olympic aquatics centre package to cost £303m

The overall cost of the aquatics centre complex will be £303m, the Olympic Delivery Authority has announced.

The price will include Zaha Hadid’s centre, to be built by Balfour Beatty for £242m, together with a £61m bridge linking it with the rest of the park.

The Olympic Delivery Authority also confirmed Team Stadium, the team led by Sir Robert McAlpine, HOK Sport and Buro Happold, as the contractor for the £496m stadium.

Balfour Beatty, confirmed today as the winning bidder for the Zaha Hadid-designed aquatics centre, has been given a budget of £242m for the building itself and a further £61m budget for the land-bridge that will form part of the building’s roof.

The £303m figure far exceeds all predictions for how much the centre would cost to build; it was widely expected to have a price tag of £213m, including surrounding infrastructure.

However, the ODA said: “The total of £303m has not changed throughout the procurement process and is within the ODA’s baseline budget as announced by DCMS last December.”

The confirmation of Team Stadium as main contractor comes nine months after a memorandum of understanding was signed. The site has now been handed over to Sir Robert McAlpine and construction has started, three months earlier than originally announced.

The ODA also revealed that the budget for construction and legacy conversion of the Olympic velodrome will be £80m. It said it will announce a contractor within weeks, though Building understands that Carillion is favourite for the job.