A giant artificial park has been built for the Olympics on the edge of the Olympic facilities. It will clean the atmosphere very locally and offer a relaxing place for the athletes and later, for the local residents. This is the largest single green space in the capital.

The 500 hectare Olympic Forest Park was built very quickly since it started in June 2005. Only 3 years and 770 million Euros later, the results are impressive.

Where there once were only vacant lots and shacks and agricultural fields, there is now a big hill, a lake, canals and hundreds of thousands of newly planted trees.

Everything in this park is artificial. The hill was built with the rubble recovered from the construction of the stadium and other nearby Olympic facilities. The lake was dug by bulldozers and is irrigated by 280,000 m3 of water which are pumped everyday through 40km of pipes ranging from outside the city. The trees arrived on trucks by the thousands from the neighboring province of Hebei and the western city of Xi'an to be replanted in Beijing.

In total, over 500,000 pines and cypress made the journey to Beijing for the Olympics, as many as the number of foreign tourists expected for the event! The municipality hopes to improve air quality near the sports facilities by building this park. It also wants to offer the Olympic family a green refuge from the rest of the urban atmosphere which is quite heavy during the summer.

The month of August being generally rainy, the park was designed to collect as much rainwater as possible (70%). The water will be used, after being processed, at the Olympic Village and the other facilities for the Olympics. On the pollution side of things, the results will be very limited and Beijing's air will continue to have humongous particulate concentrations. On the other hand, the park will bring a touch of freshness for the athletes and a touch of green for the eyes.

Back to the nature

Once you enter the park, you feel like you have left the city. Say goodbye to cars and exhaust fumes, because everyone moves around on foot and electric vehicles. Open to the public before the start of the Olympics, the place was immediately inundated by visitors who head for the shade under the trees. "It is really good here" welcomes one of the capital's senior citizens "It's almost as quiet as in my hometown!"

It is true that you can easily forget that you are still in the middle of over 15 million people metropolis. At the top of the hill, the view is impressive even though most of it is a view on the surrounding city. The Olympic facilities and modern buildings spread onto the horizon beyond the artificial lake. On the other side, towards the north, a sea of green trees spreads out until the new towers that form the periphery of urban Beijing. The local visitors are clearly satisfied with this relaxing new place. They take the opportunity to take photos, daydream in the grass or simply enjoy some ice cream.

The slight downsides are the music on loudspeakers main walkways of the park and surveillance cameras spoil this little slice of nature. Nevertheless, the guards and the park staff are very friendly and smiling. You will unfortunately have to wait until the end of the Olympics before you can take full advantage of this small green jewel. It will remain reserved for the Olympic family until the end of the events and the northern part of the park will only be accessible starting from 2009. What a shame...

Text and Photos: Nicolas Sridi
July 2008