The proposed Sports City Stadium in Doha will feature 47,560 seats. The vision is to create a retractable roof, partly retractable pitch and retractable stands that will make the stadium a premiere multi-use facility in the decades following the 2022 FIFA World Cup. The stadium’s innovative features will make it an ideal venue for football matches, as well as concerts, theatre performances and non-football related athletic events.
Veteran sports architect Dan Meis from the Kansas City architecture firm Populous, led the innovative stadium design. According to the architect, the main objective behind the stadium design project was to create a venue with a lasting effect.
Inspired by the form of the Bedouin tent, which is traditionally used by the Arab ethnic group, Dan Meis has integrated flexible design elements into the design. The tents are notable for their simple architectural design, enabling them to adapt to their environment.
The partially retractable roof, which will open and close in 15 to 20 minutes, has been designed to hold people within it. The technology to adjust seating draws on Saitama Stadium in Japan. Large seating blocks move on trucks, and they can slide back and be moved elsewhere to open up space. They are similar to the retractable field used at the University of Phoenix Stadium in Glendale, Arizona.
An in-stadium cooling system will be installed to help players and spectators from overheating in a climate where temperatures surpass 100 degrees. The hot water will run through an absorption chiller that will chill the water and send it into another tank. The tank will pump 64-degree air at the ankle and neck level in each row of seats. The air will be distributed throughout the stadium, eventually producing an 80 degree temperature near the soccer pitch. The cooling system will be combined with the stadium’s retractable roof, extending its reach beyond the pitch to plazas outside the venue to create an oasis-like feel in the desert.
Qatar is planning to build 12 eco-friendly, carbon-neutral stadiums for the 2022 FIFA World Cup. Sports City Stadium is said to be one of the most versatile of the 12 stadiums to be built in Qatar’s proposed $57 billion plan.
The FIFA Executive Committee has chosen Russia to host the 2018 FIFA World Cup, while the 2022 FIFA World Cup was awarded to Qatar.
