Wydział Architektury

Rozprawa doktorska Mgr inż. arch. Piotr Łabowicz-Sajkiewicz

„Wybrane zagadnienia projektowania współczesnych hal widowiskowo-sportowych, na przykładzie Areny Kraków – zrealizowanej hali widowiskowo-sportowej w Krakowie Czyżynach dla 18 000 (22 800) widzów”.

Opiekun naukowy: dr inż. arch. Kazimierz Butelski, prof. PK

Kraków, 01.02.2018 Summary Sports and entertainment halls are a specific group of objects, which entertainment and sports functions depend on the size of the object, its adaptability to serve various purposes, the ease of adapting the object to particular type of events and safety requirements, which can be fulfilled by the object. The development of multifunctional halls of a sport and entertainment character played an important role in the field of designing public utility buildings. It is a technical as well as a logistic challenge. Very important requirement pertaining to this problem, is to ensure an optimal safety. More and more often all available resources are being applied and numerous countries adopt building regulations, which allow the architects to utilise each and every safety strategy, providing its usefulness can be appropriately proven. Mutual coordination of numerous factors and conditions, within the frame of one project is the major challenge for the architect designing such an object. The basis for modern construction industry is formed by the requirements for the buildings, specified by various technical and building regulations. In accordance to Art. 5 item 1 of the Building Law, the public utility buildings, which are building objects, including the structures and infrastructure associated with those buildings and taking into consideration the expected life of such complex, shall be constructed in a way specified in the regulations and in accordance to the technical knowledge, ensuring that the basic requirements pertaining to:

• construction safety, • fire safety, and • users’ safety, have been fulfilled. An example of such building is the Tauron Arena Sports and Entertainment hall in Kraków. It was built between 2008 and 2014 for 18 000 spectators, and currently it can accommodate 22 800 visitors. On the basis of the author’s own experience and research, an analysis of the selected design aspects and their mutual relations during the investment process, associated with the construction of the Tauron Arena Kraków has been performed. An important research material can be found by studying various objects built both in Europe and around the world. The history of large objects, constructed for large groups of people congregating to watch and enjoy cultural or sports events begun in Ancient Greece. An important structure, preserved from the ancient times is the Roman Coliseum, built in the years 72 – 80. This is a building constructed on an ellipsis, which can accommodate up to 50 000 spectators – depending on the character of the performance. Often sports and entertainment objects have been built as Olympic Games venues, e.g. the Panathinaikos stadium, which was an arena of the Great Panathenaic Games and the first Olympic Games of the modern times; the Palazzetto dello Sport, sports and entertainment hall in , the Olimpijskij Complex in Russia or the Yoyogi National Gymnasium in Japan. An analysis of those materials seems important from the scientific point of view, as it allows to understand the mutual relations associated with such objects, taken into consideration during the design process. Social impact of the sports and entertainment halls shall be applied to various scales, beginning from the local scale, through the city and country scale, and finally the global impact, what takes place in case of the events such as the Olympic Games. The scale of the hall objects means that they are a strong dominant in the city silhouette and their perception at the specific moment depend on numerous factors influencing the judgment of the observer. Thus the construction of the sports and entertainment halls is an important factor in the creation of the new city panoramas of old towns. The analysis covers the group of objects, of the capacity between 10 000 and 24 000 spectators, completed during the last decade of the 20th century and at the beginning of the 21st century – up to 2016. This group of objects comprises mainly of buildings of a regional scale, constructed for the purpose of housing sports events, including the Olympic Games, World Championships, short track events or musical concerts and festivals. At the same time, those objects are fit to serve as entertainment venues. The selected time frame is the period, during which the entertainment segment becomes more important and it becomes equal to the sports function. Unlike before, when the entertainment sector was only complementary to the sports functions. The purpose of this research was to analyse a representative group of public utility objects and to determine, how the Kraków Arena fits in the global trends in designing the modern sports and entertainment halls. Verification of 40 objects, both in Poland and around the world has been performed. The researched objects included: the Madison Square Garden in New York, the Mercedes -Benz Arena in Shanghai, in London, the Arena Jaragua in Brazil, the Hisense Arena in Australia, the Vector Arena in New Zealand, Spodek Katowice in Poland, the Richmond Olympic Oval in Canada, the Mediolanum Forum in and the Ericsson Globe in Sweden. By extracting specific characteristic parameters, describing each of those 40 objects, an overview of the basic trends in designing sports and entertainment halls has been derived. The aspects such as: the location, outline of the building form with regard to the cohesion of the building, form of the building itself, shape of the auditorium/stands, auditorium layout and functional diagram, type and construction of the auditorium, roof construction or type of the multimedia system. Apart from the general factors, for all of those buildings, each of those constructions has its individual features, depending on numerous factors. In particular, the issue, which shall be analysed thoroughly is the hall’s functional versatility in the context of the effect of such versatility, allowing to accommodate the most broad of entertainment, on the final architectural solution. In their majority, those objects were located in the centres of urban agglomerations, what was a result of the access to technical infrastructure and the necessity to provide an efficient communication. Equally important was the optimisation of the shape of the building and the analysis of the requirements pertaining to the desired function of the object. The issues associated with the function are always the resultant of the expectations of the local citizens, business and sport groups. This gives a sort of basis for developing an optimal solution for the specific object. The domineering trend in designing the forms of the objects is the strive to achieve an oval shaped object. This is further confirmed by the design of an oval shaped, symmetrical auditorium, closely following the form of the building. As a result, the roof of the hall is usually constructed as a steel structural system. When forming the internal structure of the hall, the strive towards permanent and foldable auditorium sections, with lodge seating located at the central level, is visible and the tendency to utilise the main, central multimedia system is also noticeable. A complementary trend involves the use of reinforced concrete structures in the fixed sections of the auditorium. Numerous design and technical problems are associated with issues, which have not been yet solved from the engineering point of view. Thus there is the necessity to utilise experimental solutions and to build prototypes. Also the dynamic development of technology, which precedes the process of construction of the hall, has significant impact on the construction of sports and entertainment objects. It means that the buildings are being subjected to constant modernisations, stemming from the technological and program advancements. The optimal auditorium arrangement for the entertainment events is a three sided one. What is interesting, the historic shape of the Greek theatres, based on a semi – circle, is reflected in the often used semicircular arranged of the mobile stands. This aspect is a result of tendencies in designing multi functional halls and the necessity to subject those buildings to the requirements of the entertainment type events. During the entertainment events, the stage plays the leading role, thus the traditional auditorium, devoted to team sports events is superseded by the new arrangements. The design of the Kraków Arena is a result of many deliberations on the methods of shaping the sports and entertainment objects, to obtain a form, which would be the best answer to the needs and expectations of the Kraków and the region citizens. The process of conceptual and design works, preparation of the building, workshop and executory documentation is an important, varied creative process, which has been spread over several years. The varied character of the media characteristics and the progress in the attractive character of the entertainment events shall also be considered to be an important factor in the building process. The multifunctional character and the significance of the object required constant technological updates, following the development of engineering technologies. The construction started in May 2011 and in May 2014 the object was delivered for use. The key issue in locating the complex and the arrangement of the main functional sections was the lot destined for the investment, its shape and the local communication network. A valuable and highlighting the importance of the hall public area was designed around the hall itself. It gives the operator the chance to organize outdoor events. The floor plan of the building, the auditorium arrangement and the hall form are an effect of the optimisation of the layout and the communication system. The outside shape of the stands is a result of the desire to obtain the maximum number of seats in those sectors, from which the view is the best. The most beneficial and proven plan of the auditorium, following a curved line, has been used. This significantly improves the visibility of the events and means that the auditorium forms one, closed ring. The hall roof was constructed in form of steel, rebar/cable structure, connected to the reinforced concrete beam, running along the perimeter of the building and supported on reinforced concrete poles. The circle of reinforced concrete poles, highlighting the crown of the auditorium also supports the main ring of the roof structure, creating a statically closed system, with attached lightweight, wire structure of the decking. All requirements of the international sports federations, pertaining to the size of the playing fields, visibility profiles and the size of locker room areas, have been met. This allows to organise international sporting events, such as European or World Championships. The necessity to answer the expectations of the modern day user of multifunctional objects means that the problems of adapting the hall to mass events: concerts, congresses, expositions, trade fairs, film shows, dancing events, social and political meetings or publicly accessible commercial and sports events, became very important. Numerous changes to the initial design have been implemented during the construction process. This was due to the necessity of adapting the object to the binding regulations and new technical solutions and the development of the media installation within the building, so as a result, the finished hall would be in line with the newest structural and spatial solutions and would be equipped with the best safety and media systems. The finished hall allows to monitor and control the multimedia and light effects from any place within the building. The functioning technologies include: an access control system, together with the break in alarm, the CO and LPG detection system in the garages, the SMS (security management) system, the digital signage system (distribution and managing the presentation of graphics on various digital screens and barriers) and the mobile device control system, which also works as a system delivering information for the spectators present within the hall. The Kraków Arena is well within the median of the solutions applied for the objects of this type and scale. The sports and entertainment hall, designed together with the spatial and recreational area, is the largest in Poland and one of the largest in Europe. It was equipped with numerous original solutions and matches global standards, consistent with the requirements of the modern societies. The classic design problems include: the accommodation of the building cubature into the neighbourhood, so when the form of the building is created the scale of the building would not dominate the cityscape, and the cityscape would be protected. Other important factor is the issue of modern user’s expectations, demanding quick adaptation of the hall to various forms of entertainment. Those requests are formulated parallel to the requirements, that the upkeep of the hall will be easy and cost effective. The Tauron Arena Kraków has its unique, individual character, what makes it one of the highlights of the city. To obtain the final effect, numerous important problems, associated with the design of such objects, had to be solved. Those problems include:

• Issues pertaining to the safety of the events – especially in the context of the hazards of terrorist attacks.

• Issues pertaining to the fire safety in sports and entertainment halls, where the multi – level analyses were necessary and due to the hall’s versatility, the above standard solutions have been adopted.

• Issues pertaining to the application of the most innovative multimedia technologies, which allow to change the active forms at the facade of the building, to be able to match the display to the character of the event.

In the future, the conducted analysis of the sports and entertainment halls can be used do select the best parameters for the particular design and additionally, it could be used to develop functional programs and to search for optimal balance between the form, function and technology.