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Tottenham Hotspur Stadium

London, United Kingdom

Year

Opened 2019

Duration

4 years

Cost

£1.2 billion

Location

United Kingdom
Project achievements

Environment benefitted

Implemented a wide variety of sustainability measures

Economy boosted

Boosted the economy of north London

Used engineering skill

Features the ingenious retractable football pitch

Designing a multipurpose, sustainable sports stadium

The Tottenham Hotspur Stadium in north London is the football club’s new home since 2019.

With a capacity of 62,850 people, it's the largest club stadium in the city.

It’s a place where all football fans can enjoy a match – regardless of whether that’s football or American football.

The stadium has an innovative retractable grass pitch that allows the venue to shift from a football pitch to an American football field. An engineering marvel!

It also allows the stadium to hold concerts. They’ve hosted big names like Beyoncé and the Red Hot Chili Peppers.

As well as displaying engineering prowess, the stadium has implemented several sustainability measures.

For example, it’s powered by 100% renewable energy, it has a zero waste to landfill policy and initiatives to reduce single-use plastic.

These, among other practices, earned the club the top spot in the Premier League sustainability table for the last three years in a row, coming joint first alongside Liverpool Football Club in 2023.

The stadium has also won several awards including the 2019 Building Awards Project of the Year and the 2021 RIBA National and London Awards.

How does the retractable pitch work?

TV presenter Richard Hammond explains how the stadium moves the 9000 tonne pitch.

Did you know …

  1. It has an innovative retractable grass surface which allows the stadium to also host American football, rugby and concerts.

  2. The South Stand is the largest single-tier stand in the UK, with a capacity of 17,500 people.

  3. The South Stand is also home to Europe’s longest bar, The Goal Line.

How was the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium built?

Delivering the stadium’s famous retractable grass pitch required ingenuity.

When not centre-stage, the pitch slots into the stadium’s parking garage.

However, to do so, it has to move around another key structural feature – the ‘tree’ columns that support the largest single-tier stand in the UK.

That would be the stadium’s South Stand, which has a capacity of 17,500 people. It’s supported by two massive steel columns, each weighing 275 tonnes, that branch out at the top, resembling branches.

To fit around the columns, the pitch is neatly split into three parts, and then transported to the car park on enormous steel trays that travel on wheels and rail.

Believe it or not, that whole process only takes 25 minutes!

Other ingenious engineering features include the roof, which is made up of structural tension tables that affix to a compression ring.

If you fancy a closer look at the roof, why not sign up to do the stadium’s ‘Dare’ skywalk? That’d only take you 46.8m above the pitch...

Difference the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium has made

Apart from showcasing engineering innovation, the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium has brought a number of benefits for the club’s supporters and the community in north London.

Between the games and other visitor attractions, the stadium sees nearly two million visits a year. This amounts to an annual boost of about £344m to the local economy.

There are 61 food and drink outlets available for fans to enjoy, with plant-based options widely available. It provides a space for people to come together and make a day out of enjoying sport.

The stadium’s construction also enabled the creation of 3,500 jobs.

To offset its carbon footprint, the club has planted hundreds of trees and thousands of plants around its training centre.

The club has set up initiatives to educate young people about sustainability through the Tottenham Hotspur Foundation.

It also promotes alternative forms of transport for supporters and staff to get to and from the stadium in a more environmentally conscious way.

Tottenham Hotspur has joined the UN Race to Zero, committing to halve its carbon emissions by 2030 and achieve net zero carbon by 2040.

It’s also a signatory of the UN Sports for Climate Action Framework and a founding partner of Count Us In, a global movement looking to mobilise 1 billion people to take climate action.

People who made it happen

  • Client: Tottenham Hotspur Football Club
  • Architect and principal designer: Populous
  • Planning consultant: DP9
  • Roof structural engineer: Schlaich Bergermann Partner
  • Shell and core structural engineer: Buro Happold Engineering
  • Retractable pitch engineer: SCX Special Projects
  • Quantity surveyor: Arcadis
  • Main contractor: Mace
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