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25-Aug-2005
Last Edited
Unsportsmanlike Conduct
Olympic Stadium Developers Jeopardize Original Design
By Molly Ball
The Cambodia Daily
The new fence does not encircle the entire property of the complex-a masterfully integrated, beautifully landscaped work conceptually modeled on Angkor Wat.
It goes only around the buildings, cutting them off from the surrounding moats and open space. According to the world-renowned architect as well as international experts, it is defacing one of Cambodia's most unique and priceless works of art, and it could ruin the city's drainage system in the process.
"They have no right to take this land that belongs to the stadium," Vann Molyvann says, staring sadly at the workers painting the fence's concrete posts. "These boundaries are all false. These boundaries should be removed."
Next week the Yuan Ta Group, a
Taiwanese developer, is scheduled to hand the renovated Olympic Stadium
back over to the Ministry of Education, Youth and Sport. It will have
new seats on the bleachers, new scoreboards on the courts and fields.
But the stadium the government will get back will be only a fraction of
what Vann Molyvann created. According to illustrations provided by Yuan
Ta, the government will get a fenced rectangle enclosing the 60,000-seat
stadium, pool, grandstands, indoor arena and outdoor tennis, volleyball
and basketball courts.
The surrounding area will remain in the hands of Yuan Ta, and piece by
piece, over the next four to five years, what is now open, green space
punctuated by rectangular pools will be filled in, paved over, and built
up.
The majestic view of the stadium,
rising out of the center of the city from an idyllic natural
plane, will disappear; instead, drivers along Sihanouk, Polish
People's Republic and Charles de Gaulle boulevards will pass
long, uniform three-story brick-and-concrete buildings filled
with shops and apartments. The beginnings of these can already
be seen on the site.
In the northern portion of the complex, the two largest
ponds-currently an integral part of the municipal drainage
system-will eventually give way to a shopping mall, parking
garage and five-star hotel, company drawings show.
"We want to respect the original idea of the designers," Yuan Ta
General Manager Hong Chuang Ming says. "Because the stadium is
historical, we have followed the original idea
[in renovating it]-original color, original material, original style. We don't change it, just renovate." He said the company has spent more than the $3.6 million it budgeted for the renovations alone.
Hong Chuang Ming does not see the
space around the stadium, the gracefully asymmetrical grounds dotted
with palm trees and tranquil pools, as part of the structure. "The ponds
around the stadium have been [neglected] for a long time already and no
one maintains them," the manager says. "They are full of mud and sewage,
and in the summer they smell bad."
Getting rid of them, he says, will improve the stadium. "Now we combine
the modern style and the historical style to make the new center of
Phnom Penh," he says. "We will make the historical [stadium] come to
life. We will make this a tourist place."
The stadium's history is a grand one. It opened in 1964, inaugurated
by then-prince Norodom Sihanouk as a symbol of the self-sufficiency and
neutrality of post-colonial Cambodia.
"Yes, despite the criticism and slander of some of our neighbors and
their imperialist masters, we have proved our capacity to transform our
ancient Kingdom into a modern nation," he said at the stadium's opening.
Except for the advice of a few foreign experts, the stadium was built
entirely with Cambodian funds.
As many as 100,000 people are said to have attended the stadium's
inauguration and the Games of the New Emerging Forces in 1966. Another
symbolic event, the Ganefo gathered the world's "non-aligned"
countries-Third World nations seeking Cold War neutrality.
Also in 1966, French President Charles de Gaulle gave a landmark speech
at the stadium, lauding Cambodia's neutrality and calling for peace in
Indochina. "France's stand is taken," he said-the US must pull out of
Vietnam, whose people are entitled to self-determination.
For Vann Molyvann, then a rising star in his 30s, the opportunity to
undertake such a massive project was exhilarating. It was the perfect
chance for him to explore his central idea-the marriage of a modern
aesthetic with traditional Khmer forms and techniques.
He sought a continuity between the sacred shapes of the Angkor temples,
the simple grace of traditional rural construction and the sleek,
minimalist international style of the day. This idea resulted in
individual touches like the flat-roofed grandstand, the breathtaking
indoor arena-slats between the seats let in enough gentle light and air
to illuminate and cool it-and the pools of water, small ones near the
main building and large reservoirs in the surrounding grounds.
But Vann Molyvann's inspiration was more holistic than that. He wanted
to reproduce the remarkable effect of Angkor Wat, whose builders created
not just a structure but an experience: They determined what the view
would be from every doorway and causeway, leading the viewer through a
series of perfect vistas.
"We know the Khmers calculated everything in building Angkor Wat. All
the dimensions have meaning," Vann Molyvann says. "The eye walks through
the promenade, through shadowy spaces. Then this explodes into light.
You look up and you are in the open." The same near-transcendental
effect occurs as you enter the stadium.
The stadium is functional as well as beautiful, of course, from the
compact form that allows it to occupy a relatively small footprint to
the reservoirs that serve to absorb rainwater and process sewage.
Bou Chum Serey, undersecretary of state responsible for sports in the
Ministry of Education, admits that the original contract with Yuan Ta
did not take the pools into account. "We did not understand why the
ponds were built around the stadium," he says. "But now we know that
they built it to prevent water from flooding the city."
He claims the ministry and the developer have found another solution to
the drainage problem. "We have another way to prevent floods and develop
that land for economic benefit," he says.
Hong Chuang Ming said the company has devised "a system" involving
digging tunnels under the entire site. "We will fill [the ponds] and
then make new drainage," he says.
Neither Hong Chuang Ming nor Bou Chum Serey sees the ponds and green
space as aesthetically significant. "There are a few people who
understand [Vann Molyvann's] master plan and why he built the ponds
around the stadium," the undersecretary says. "What good are they?"
One of those few people is Etienne Clement, country representative for
the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, who says he is
"very concerned" about the stadium. "Unesco has expressed concern
several times" to government officials responsible for the stadium, he
says.
In addition to depriving city residents of exercise facilities by
closing the stadium for so long, the stadium development process has not
been transparent, Clement claims.
Surrounding the stadium with new buildings exasperates Clement-"The
stadium needs to have space!" he says. The stadium's plight will be
highlighted in an upcoming conference on protecting Phnom Penh's
20th-century heritage, he adds.
To Helen Grant Ross of Architecture Research Khmer, which has mounted a
campaign against the stadium development, "It's a tragedy." The stadium,
she says, is unique in the region and could be used to host major
sporting events-if it weren't being transformed.
"What they are doing is making the building dysfunctional," she says of
the developers. "To our mind this is architectural heritage like the
Sydney opera house. It is absolutely remarkable." (Additional reporting
by Phann Ana)
The Cambodia Daily , WEEKEND Saturday, September 28-29, 2002