For almost four years, the SAP Garden has been being built in the Olympic Park – where the cycling stadium was demolished in 2015 – a multi-purpose hall in which, once completed, the EHC Red Bull Munich ice hockey club and the FC Bayern basketball team will play their home games.
The sports arena is scheduled to open in spring 2024. The landscape around the building is currently being designed – and many passers-by were surprised: stones, gravel and earth were not distributed, but instead large plastic panels were laid, onto which a thin layer of plants was then applied. Many people asked themselves that this should be ecological and sustainable?
It is, says Alexander Blank, spokesman for Red Bull Stadion GmbH, which is responsible for the construction: “In order to guarantee the load-bearing capacity of the hall roof and at the same time fit the structure harmoniously into the natural landscape of the Olympic Park, we rely on the use of light building materials.” Beneath the gently rolling, artificial hills there are three additional ice surfaces for various ice sports, which are available to promote young talent and for popular sports.
The plastic panels are so-called EPS geoblocks made of Styrofoam. Their advantage over natural materials: They are much lighter, they are dimensionally stable – unlike gravel, which settles over time – and they do not rot and are insensitive to moisture. This type of construction offers the advantage for the statics of the underlying building parts that less weight has to be carried and therefore less steel and concrete has to be used. According to the data sheet, the material is chemically and biologically neutral and CFC-free.
According to the builder, the plastic panels have several advantages, including they weigh less.
(Photo: Barbara Schwindt)
On the subject of sustainability, the Stadion-GmbH also emphasizes that the energy required to operate an ice rink can be guaranteed all year round thanks to the first photovoltaic system in the Olympic Park. During later operations, the conversion from an ice stadium to a basketball stadium will be completed in six hours – the ice surface will remain and will only be covered. The spectator capacity should be 12,500 people (basketball) and 11,250 people (ice hockey), including up to 2,000 standing room. The construction costs have increased from the originally planned 100 to 150 million euros.