Olympic Park Site Research Articles

The first evaluation of formaldehyde column observations by improved Pandora spectrometers during the KORUS-AQ field study.

The Korea-United States Air Quality Study (KORUS-AQ) conducted during May-June 2016 offered the first opportunity to evaluate direct-sun observations of formaldehyde (HCHO) total column densities with improved Pandora spectrometer instruments. The measurements highlighted in this work were conducted both in the Seoul megacity area at the Olympic Park site (37.5232° N, 27.1260° E; 26 ma.s.l.) and at a nearby rural site downwind of the city at the Mount Taehwa research forest site (37.3123° N, 127.3106° E; 160ma.s.l.). Evaluation of these measurements was made possible by concurrent ground-based in situ observations of HCHO at both sites as well as overflight by the NASA DC-8 research aircraft. The flights provided in situ measurements of HCHO to characterize its vertical distribution in the lower troposphere (0-5km). Diurnal variation in HCHO total column densities followed the same pattern at both sites, with the minimum daily values typically observed between 6:00 and 7:00 local time, gradually increasing to a maximum between 13:00 and 17:00 before decreasing into the evening. Pandora vertical column densities were compared with those derived from the DC-8 HCHO in situ measured profiles augmented with in situ surface concentrations below the lowest altitude of the DC-8 in proximity to the ground sites. A comparison between 49 column densities measured by Pandora vs. aircraft-integrated in situ data showed that Pandora values were larger by 16% with a constant offset of 0.22DU (Dobson units; R 2 = 0.68). Pandora HCHO columns were also compared with columns calculated from the surface in situ measurements over Olympic Park by assuming a well-mixed lower atmosphere up to a ceilometer-measured mixed-layer height (MLH) and various assumptions about the small residual HCHO amounts in the free troposphere up to the tropopause. The best comparison (slope = 1.03±0.03; intercept = 0.29±0.02DU; and R 2 = 0.78±0.02) was achieved assuming equal mixing within ceilometer-measured MLH combined with an exponential profile shape. These results suggest that diurnal changes in HCHO surface concentrations can be reasonably estimated from the Pandora total column and information on the mixed-layer height. More work is needed to understand the bias in the intercept and the slope relative to columns derived from the in situ aircraft and surface measurements.

Sustainable site clean-up from megaprojects: lessons from London 2012

The London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games are considered to have been a great success for the UK. In building the Olympic Park, another great achievement was the clean-up and reuse of a large area of contaminated land. A remediation project of this size would typically take 5 to 15 years to complete, but the project team completed the remediation work in less than 3 years. This study provides an in-depth examination of the remediation practices at the site, mainly from the perspective of sustainable construction. Data were collected from multiple sources, including project files, publications by various government agencies and non-governmental organisations, as well as qualitative interviews with project team members. The paper first presents a review of brownfield redevelopment and sustainable remediation literature. Sustainability initiatives and achievements in the Olympic Park site remediation project are summarised and discussed. These mainly included suitable remediation strategies, recycling and reuse of contaminated soil by using soil washing and innovative in situ remediation of contaminated groundwater through bioremediation. The paper identifies a number of challenges and lessons learned regarding brownfield remediation in megaprojects, which warrant further technological development and appropriate policy actions to address.

Using a hybrid LCA method to evaluate the sustainability of sediment remediation at the London Olympic Park

Abstract Remediation operations may have a wide range of environmental, social and economic impacts not only within the physical boundary of a contaminated site and over the operational period, but also across geophysical boundaries and beyond project life cycle. Life cycle assessment (LCA) has been increasingly used by both researchers and industrial practitioners in the ongoing green and sustainable remediation movement. This paper proposes a new hybrid-LCA method. In comparison with most remediation LCA studies in literature, the proposed approach offers several advantages by: 1) expanding the system boundary and reduces truncation errors; 2) incorporating consequential benefits (i.e. tertiary impact) of remediation; and 3) covering social and economic impact in addition to environmental impact. The hybrid LCA method is built on the 123 sector input–output analytical table and environmental account for the UK. The model was augmented with additional socioeconomic data (e.g. employment, occupational health and safety) to measure social and economic impact indicators. A sediment remediation project at the London Olympic Park site was examined using this method. The hybrid LCA was found to capture an additional 32% of secondary impact in soil washing, and 8% of secondary impact in landfilling. The tertiary impact was found to be over twice the primary plus secondary impact in soil washing, and nearly 80% of the primary plus secondary impact in landfilling. The quantitative social and economic impact assessment results also provided useful information for holistic decision making, balancing project costs with social and economic benefits.

Delivering London 2012: site-wide logistics

The UK Olympic Delivery Authority began to define the methodology for an ambitious construction programme on the 2·7 km2 Olympic Park site for the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games, which came with significant constraints. The construction programme included 14 Games time venues and other buildings; the infrastructure and utilities sufficient to service a small town; 300 residential and commercial buildings to be demolished and 2·6 million m3 of soil to be remediated. This £6 billion construction programme was to be completed in 3·5 years. At its peak this resulted in 4500 vehicle movements each day, 81 tier 1 contractors, and 3000 tier 2 contractors together with their subcontractors and suppliers and up to 9000 people involved in construction.

The development of a GIS methodology to assess the potential for water resource contamination due to new development in the 2012 Olympic Park site, London

The Initial Screening Tool (IST) has been developed to enable Planners to assess the potential risk to ground and surface water due to remobilisation of contaminants by new developments. The IST is a custom built GIS application that improves upon previous screening tools developed by the British Geological Survey (BGS) through the inclusion of 3-D geological data and an enhanced scoring methodology. The key new feature of the IST is the ability to track individual pollutant linkages, from a source of contamination, along multiple possible Pathways to potentially susceptible Receptors. A rule based approach allows the methodology to be easily updated, and as a result the IST has a role in scenario planning. The application provides output in the form of an automatically generated report, in which details of the potential pollutant linkages identified are presented. The initial research area selected was the Olympic Park site, London.

Children in Apartments: Implications for the Compact City

Apartments are often portrayed as the domain of young singles, couples and ‘empty nesters’. This article focuses on research undertaken in Sydney (Australia) where a disparity exists between identified planning assumptions regarding apartment residents and the actual apartment population. This article presents an innovative analysis of Australian Census data that identifies lower income households with children as a significant sub-sector of the resident apartment population, geographically concentrated in the lower value middle-ring suburbs of Sydney. An examination of one middle-ring urban renewal site (the Sydney Olympic Park site) provides evidence to suggest that new residential developments adjacent to areas dominated by an apartment market with a significant proportion of lower income families with children are themselves likely to see an influx of these households. The article concludes with a discussion of the implications of these findings for planners and developers, as well as for service provision at a local council level.

Delivering London 2012: power lines undergrounding

The complex and challenging project to move two sets of existing power lines from pylons into tunnels was fundamental to unlocking the Olympic Park site for the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games. As the first major construction project for the games, the careful planning, collaborative working and innovation used by the project team set a benchmark for all subsequent contracts on the park. This paper describes the fundamentals of the project, which included ten shafts and 13 km of tunnels in difficult ground, as well as the challenges that were overcome and the key features of success.

Delivering London 2012: health and safety

This paper describes the challenge of managing health and safety during construction of the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games. The workforce on the Olympic Park site in east London peaked at 12 000 and a total of 30 000 people will have worked on the project through its lifetime. Through careful planning, implementation of strategies with a proven track record and clear leadership, the Olympic Delivery Authority managed to achieve an accident frequency rate comparable to the average for all British employment, significantly better than the construction sector. The project's health programme also provided a degree of care and campaigning not previously experienced in construction.

Delivering London 2012: environmental management

The Olympic Park site in east London was fragmented, polluted and divided by pylons and railways. In preparation for the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games, the UK's Olympic Delivery Authority has implemented environmental improvement on a huge scale – including remediating large swathes of the former industrial land, repairing and improving the waterways, removing invasive plants in river and rail corridors, and creating new habitats for native flora and fauna. This paper considers the London 2012 environmental strategy, the challenges in developing and implementing the strategy across the project, the achievements with regard to ecology, air quality, noise and waste, and the lessons which have been learned.

An initial screening tool for water resource contamination due to development in the Olympic Park 2012 site, London

Groundwater is the primary source of potable water in southeast England. Its protection in urban environments is of paramount importance. Following a scoping study the British Geological Survey (BGS) established a project to develop an initial screening tool (IST) to assist the planning community in the assessment of the potential risk to ground and surface waters from contaminants mobilised as a consequence of redevelopment. The tool has been designed in the context of the source-pathway-receptor paradigm that informs Part IIa of the UK Environmental Protection Act (1990). Building on the work of previous screening tools and in particular ConSEPT, a BGS contaminated site evaluation and prioritisation tool, the IST incorporates significant refinements to scoring methodologies and takes the prioritisation approach into the 3-D environment. Implemented as a customised GIS application and utilising surfaces extracted from 3-D geological modelling, the tool collates and interrogates a range of geoscientific information, including contaminant scale, geological, historic land use, groundwater level and hydrogeological domain data. The IST facilitates the ranking of various proposed development scenarios through a semi-quantitative assessment of contamination potential, via a number of pollutant linkages, providing planners with reports on the type, spatial distribution and hazards associated with potential contaminant sources within their area. To achieve this, a range of evaluation factors applied to the sources, pathways and receptors are scored through a combination of spatial and attribute queries, then assessed on the basis of potential linkages. The initial research area selected for the application of the IST was the Olympic Park site, London.

Caractéristiques géotechniques du secteur du Parc Olympique, Montréal

Under natural conditions, the western limit of the Olympic Park site along Sherbrooke Street is formed by a terrace of marine clay deposited in the Champlain Sea. This terrace has an average height of 60 ft (18 m) and overlies shallow fine grained deposits of fluvio–glacial or glacial origin, which are encountered at ground surface in the eastern part of the site. The bedrock, of Ordovician age, is part of a monoclinal structure which dips at 3° to 5° towards the northeast; bedding planes and vertical fractures form the main planes of discontinuity. The surficial part of the bedrock has been strongly disturbed by the action of glaciers during the Wisconsin glaciation: a displaced rock slab now covers the main part of the site and has greatly affected the design of the foundations for the various structures.Geotechnical investigations carried out by the City of Montreal on or near the site for earlier tunneling projects were used to establish a geotechnical map of the Olympic Park site. Based on this map, the foundation elevations for the different buildings, the type of earth supporting structures, and the geometry of cut slopes could be selected. Along Sherbrooke Street, 70 ft (21 m) deep excavations were necessary in an area where lateral movements could not be tolerated. Consequently a program for monitoring the cast-in-place diaphragm retaining wall and the slopes was carried out by the City of Montreal with the participation of the Ecole Polytechnique de Montréal. [Journal translation]