But let’s find out more on what was spent so much money
But let’s find out more on what was spent so much money, because this is a grandiose architectural structure, and we have not yet built such stadiums. In fact, not only did the money go to the cup. Near the arena was built a pedestrian and automobile bridge with a length of 420 meters, which connects the western part of the Krestovsky Island with the Primorsky district. It is for this team and some fans will get to the matches. At the same time, up to 20,000 people can be on the bridge. This can be used for commercial purposes, which the designers did – in addition to the usual roads and sidewalks, there will also be 7 thousand square meters of retail space. While it is not very clear who will earn on the sale of places for shops – the club or the mayoralty – but the idea is definitely steep.
But the issue of transport accessibility is not solved by one bridge, so another 2 metro stations are built near the stadium (besides, there is another station in 15 minutes walk). True, they will not succeed in completing the Confederations Cup, but after the opening they will ease the way to the stadium for thousands of townspeople.
But let’s go to the arena itself. Why is it so unique? First of all, this is the monumentality of the structure. “St. Petersburg” (exactly as the arena is now officially called) is the largest stadium in Eastern Europe. And the concrete for its construction was used 5.5 times more than for Wembley. If you want to understand the scale of the St. Petersburg arena, here is a comparative drawing with Luzhniki. Red color indicates the height of the uppermost stands.
Stadium-epic. How the world’s steepest football arena was opened Photo: Championship, altair-msp.ru
And in terms of technology analogues the stadium on the Krestovsky Island in the whole world can be counted on the fingers of one hand. The famous retractable field (which until it is not possible to roll out for non-technical reasons) after the construction of the St. Petersburg arena is available only in 4 stadiums of the planet. Now in the new Zenit house you can spend as many different cultural events and do not think about the harm done to the field. Also in winter, the lawn can be taken outside the arena, and it will be under a layer of snow, getting sunlight, which is quite difficult to organize inside the bowl. This will allow the club to significantly increase revenue from non-football events and have an even more enjoyable field during the first spring matches. Sliding roof, of course, is more common in the world, but for Russia this is also a novelty. Thanks to it, you can use the stadium 365 days a year without looking at the weather in the northernmost city of the Premier League. Organizing heat in the stadium, even in the Siberian frosts, will also have a ventilation system. Yesterday at the opening match, the audience felt all the convenience of the arena “St. Petersburg”, when it was cold and damp in the street, it did not bother anyone inside the stadium.
For security in the stadium is responsible for a special control point, installed inside the arena’s bowl. Almost all processes are controlled from it, and now it is not difficult to catch a violator of public order, as on video surveillance one can see the way of absolutely every fan from entering the territory before landing to his place on the sector. Also now it will not be possible to light fire-engines, since with a small smoke, automatic fire-fighting taps will direct water under pressure directly into the fire.
But these are protocol facts, but I want the stories of eyewitnesses. The founder of the blog, “Stadium on the Krestovsky Island” Yuri Bolovin visited the arena before the opening two times already and happily shared with us his emotions.
