Beijing Olympics: How modern? How different?

Let us fast foward to yr 2008 where every corner of the world will b focusing on Beijing 2008 Summer Olympics. games will be held from August 8, 2008 to August 24, 2008, with the opening ceremony commencing at 08:08pm and 08 seconds. LOL Wat an auspicious Number for the Chinese

I happen to surf across tis video in Youtube which is a documentary by Discovery Channel which explain why Beijing 2008 is not juz only abt the games but the mordern architecture buzz surrounding the games. It oso describe how they come out the idea of the Bird Nest Design and wat are the problems they encounter during the construction. The whole 45mins video is not on focusing on the stadium, it oso toks abt the construction of Beijing National Aquatics Centre (WaterCube), Wukesong Indoor Stadium (World Largest Cube LCD SCREEN), National Grand Theater (The Egg), and CCTV building. The whole video is divided into 5 diff parts which each of them showcase a diff architecture icon in Beijing. Before the video here are sum of the details of the buildings and their updates.

Part 1: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jGwDz5KkfmQ
Part 2: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YSlbr3NimV8&mode=related&search=
Part 3:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nmEyIO-LKT4&mode=related&search=

Part 4:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=16Y-dLkpfaw&mode=related&search=

Part 5: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wIDrKjvc9bk&mode=related&search=

Beijing National Stadium

The Beijing National Stadium, also known as the bird's nest, will be the main track and field stadium for the 2008 Summer Olympics and will be host to the Opening and Closing ceremonies.Pritzker Prize-winning architects Herzog & de Meuron collaborated with ArupSport and China Architecture Design & Research Group to win the competition. Contemporary Chinese artist, Ai Weiwei, is the Artistic Consultant for design. The stadium will seat as many as 100,000 spectators during the Olympics, but this will be reduced to 80,000 after the games. The stadium is 330 metres long by 220 metres wide, and is 69.2 metres tall. The 250,000 square metre (gross floor area) stadium is to be built with 36 km of unwrapped steel, with a combined weight of 45,000 tonnes. The stadium will cost up to 3.5 billion yuan (422,873,850 USD/ 325,395,593 EUR). The ground was broken in December 2003, and construction started in March 2004, but was halted by the high construction cost in August 2004.In the new design, the roof of the stadium had been omitted from the design. Experts say that this will make the stadium safer, whilst reducing construction costs. The construction of the Olympic buildings continued once again in the beginning of 2005.

Beijing National Aquatics Centre

The Beijing National Aquatics Centre, also known as the Water Cube, is an aquatics centre that is currently being built alongside Beijing National Stadium in the Olympic Green for the 2008 Summer Olympics. Ground was broken on December 24, 2003.The Water Cube was initially designed by PTW Architects from Sydney, Australia and CSCEC International Design and Arup with structural Engineers Arup conceiving the structure. The structure was built by CSCEC (China State Construction Enginering Corporation). Comprised of a steel spaceframe, it is the largest ETFE clad structure in the world with over 100,000 m² of ETFE pillows that are only eight one-thousandths of an inch in total thickness, The ETFE cladding allows more light and heat penetration than traditional glass, resulting in a 30% decrease in energy costs. The structure will have a capacity of 17,000 during the games that will be reduced to 6,000 afterwards. It also has a total land surface of 65,000 square metres and will cover a total of 7.8 acres

National Grand Theater

The National Grand Theater, also known as The Egg, is an opera house in Beijing, China. It will open sometime in 2007. It was designed by Paul Andreu and cost 2.688 billion yuan to build. The theatre seats 6,500 people and is 200,000 m² in size.
The exterior of the theate is a titanium accented glass dome that is completely surrounded by a man-made lake. It is said to look like an egg floating on water. Guests arrive in the building after walking through a hallway that goes underneath the lake. It was designed as an iconic feature, something that would be immediately recognizeable, like the Sydney Opera House. Its location, immediately to the west of the Great Hall of the People and near the Forbidden City, wasn't a popular choice for locals. Some also believe the overall design is too modern.

CCTV Headquarters

The CCTV Headquarters is a skyscraper that is currently under construction in Beijing, China. The building will be the new headquarters of China Central Television. Groundbreaking took place on September 22, 2004. It is planned to be completed in time for the 2008 Summer Olympics. Rem Koolhaas and Ole Scheeren are the designers of the building. The building will stand at 230 meters or 755 feet tall and will have 54 floors. The Office for Metropolitan Architecture won the contract from the Beijing International Tendering Co. to construct the CCTV Headquarters and the Television Cultural Center by its side on December 20, 2002. CCTV Headquarters, when completed, is slated to be among the first of 300 new towers in the new Beijing Central Business District. It is to consist of a design of a non-traditional, continuous loop in which administration, news, broadcasting, and program production will all take place.