The Olympics project is large and complex. It is not easy to quickly grasp the nature of its probable impacts on the Lower Lea Valley and London. Here is a collection of four useful papers which together give a relatively short description of some of the significant impacts.

Barcelona Housing Demo October 2006

From: The role of Mega events in urban competitiveness and its consequences on people, Carolina del Olmo, Universidad Complutense, Sept 2004

We are tired of hearing about the “Olympic legacy” and the official discourse is repeated again and again that when the mega-event concludes, the installations will remain in the city.

E-mail from pumpkinheadbc2005@yahoo.ca to 2010WATCH, 14 12 06

I have been doing some filming for a documentary that will focus on Vancouver's 2010 Olympic Games. For the past month and a half we have been focusing on the issue of homelessness in the city.

In late November, the leader of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) suggested to Britain's House of Commons that legislation should be passed prior to the 2012 Olympic Games that will make doping a punishable crime.

Manor Gardens AllotmentsManor Gardens, bequeathed to be allotments 'in perpetuity' by their original owner the 'Right Hon' Major Villiers, sit in the North central section of the Olympic Park. The LDA plan to remove them to make a footpath to the stadia, destroying in the process a century of devoted cultivation and a close-knit community rooted in this irreplaceable site.

Having spoken to a planning decisions officer for the ODA I now find not only is the relocation strategy not agreed but it is not even required as it was submitted under the original planning permissions which lapsed in January 2006 when new proposals were put forward. This was at exactly the same time as JPAT was consulting on the relocation strategy! So we were responding to a strategy which was already dead. No-one told us this and in fact we have been told over the past few months that the strategy was in force even though it was not approved. Now it appears it didn't even exist and was not even required.

Information in this section is taken from a statement by Katy Andrews, Vice-chair of the New Lammas Lands Defence Committee, made in February 2005, unless stated.

The Hackney, Walthamstow and Leyton Marshes are former Lammas Lands. This means meadows upon which parishioners had the common right to graze cattle from Lammas Day (the Celtic Midsummer Day, August 1) following the hay harvest, until Lady Day (old New Year's Day, March 25). These rights date back to before the Norman Conquest, and possibly pre date the Roman era.

The men's international tennis circuit will end with a prestigious final in London from 2009 under a four-year contract announced on Wednesday. The Masters Cup, staged in Shanghai for the last two years, is being renamed the ATP World Tour Final and is being switched to London's O2 Arena, formerly known as the Millennium Dome.

A new budget is being negotiated for the 2012 Olympics to include extensive regeneration work in east London. The original funding package is expected to be substantially increased, possibly by £2bn, to take account of work needed to prepare the site for 40,000 new homes after the games, David Higgins, chief executive of the Olympic Delivery Authority, said yesterday.

He told the Commons culture, media and sport select committee, that the creation of the new homes and 60,000 jobs in the Lower Lea Valley had not been planned at the time of the bid. "It seems crazy to complete the games and then in 2013 fit out the entire site," he said. The ODA wanted to use the games as a catalyst for the regeneration of some of London's most deprived boroughs.

A new budget will be submitted to the DCMS, which will in turn have to agree it with the Treasury. The existing funding package is £2.375bn to build the Olympic village and venues, plus an additional £1.044bn set aside for infrastructure work.

Higgins said: "We do not want to take a lot of short cuts and do a lot of superficial regeneration of the valley. The responsible thing to do is to look at what all government departments intend to spend in the Thames Gateway in the next five years. We need to co-ordinate the expenditure." It is thought that could push the Olympic project's total price tag up by between £1.5 to £2bn.

He would not be drawn on the likely additional costs of security for the games. He said London 2012 would take responsibility for in-venue security, but the police and Home Office were responsible for the broader budget outside.

From: London Games set for £2bn budget increase for new homes, Andrew Culf, October 25 10 06, The Guardian

More at: Joined-up costing

See also: Costs rising

Tessa's version

The cabinet was given an upbeat assessment of London's preparations for the 2012 Olympics yesterday by Tessa Jowell, the culture secretary, who said it was substantially ahead of other host cities at this stage of the process.

The London Assembly commissioned research into the long-term benefits of hosting the Olympic Games and Paralympic Games. The research, produced by London East Research Institute at the University of East London, examines the lasting impact of hosting the summer Games had on Barcelona, Atlanta, Sydney and Athens, measuring their achievements in nine key areas including employment, urban renewal, skills and sports participation.

Allotments near Bully Point Nature Reserve Information in this section is sourced from a report by environmental consultant Annie Chipchase, and a statement by Anne Woollett, Chair of the Hackney Marsh User Group, made in Febrary 2005, unless stated.

Planning Application 2006/3212

Notes produced by Hackney Marsh User Group.

A planning application has been submitted by Turley Associates, London Development Agency agents, to the London Borough of Hackney. It can be seen on the LDA website.

A copy of the application has been sent to HMUG with the request that comments are submitted within 21 days - ie by December 20th. We have seen no public notices of this planning application.

From 20 November to 1 December 2006, the U.N. Special Rapporteur on adequate housing as a component of the right to an adequate standard of living, Miloon Kothari, conducted a mission to Spain to examine the status of realization of the right to adequate housing….

Common Wealth or Kiss of Death? by Amita Baviskar

I am sitting across the desk from Shiela Dikshit in a room that is alive with irony. We are talking about the Commonwealth Games to be held in Delhi in 2010. The Chief Minister’s office is located in what used to be the Players’ Building, a hostel meant for Asiad’82. Asiad’82 came and went, but the Players’ Building wasn’t ready on time. For fifteen years, it remained a concrete shell looming over the west bank of the Yamuna off Vikas Marg till the Dikshit government came to its rescue. So does the ghost of games past haunt the Chief Minister? Does the spectre of prestigious projects overrunning their deadline give Ms Dikshit sleepless nights?

An Irish building magnate has won the £100million contract to run London's Olympic building programme - after making a secret donation to Tony Blair's 2012 bid team.

Reclusive Ray O'Rourke gave the 'confidential' sum as the Prime Minister spearheaded the drive to secure the Olympics for Britain. Now a consortium led by his firm Laing O'Rourke has beaten some of the world's top construction companies to win the six-year Government deal. Laing O'Rourke won the Olympic contract as the leading member of the CLM consortium which also involved another British builder, Mace, and American group CH2M HILL. An industry source said: "There was much surprise that Bechtel, which has the most experience worldwide in this sort of thing, did not win. But then it has long been rumoured that O'Rourke made a substantial sum to the bid."

Massimo Allamandola has at last been able to bring to my attention the report, which I have attached below, about the response in Nov 2005, by the 'Regents Network' of canal users to British Waterways proposal to impound the River Lea by building a 'Water Control Structure' at Prescott Channel.

King's Yard: Belfast truss roofThe ODA has gone back on the original proposal contained in the LDA’s first planning application and Olympic and Legacy Masterplans to retain the finest industrial buildings in the Olympic area at King’s Yard, Carpenter’s Road. The works, which were used for making sweets and lozenges, were erected between 1902 and 1912 and include two buildings with curved roofs on timber Belfast trusses. These are probably some of the few surviving early 20th Century industrial examples of this type of roof truss in England. Most extant 20th Century Belfast truss roofs are on WW1 aircraft hangers. English Heritage historians recommended the whole site should be listed but this was rejected by E H listing inspectors who advised the Department of Culture, Media and Sport, which is responsible for organising the Olympics, not to list the works.

The Olympic Games have displaced more than two million people in the last 20 years, disproportionately affecting minorities such as the homeless, the poor, Roma and African-Americans, according to a new report,

© Mike Wells, 0 77 99 152 888, mikejwells@yahoo.com

Synopsis

For more than a century what will be the Olympic Park was home to some of the nation’s dirtiest industries. Within, and surrounding, what will be the Olympic Park some 7,500 people were employed in the chemicals industry. A new document reveals a second case of radioactive waste dumped in 1953 in a former landfill site within the Park. An Environment Agency analysis shows higher than normal levels of radioactive material in the River Lee. The article examines the historical information available, includes quotes from experts and lawyers, and is critical of the LDA’s work in the Park, which local residents fear puts them at risk. Mike Wells is also a photographer. The article comes with photographs.

any rare and ultra-photogenic endangered species in Olympic lands that could aid the campaign?

By Mike Wells

. Recent dredging of the Lee Navigation

The Lea is a largish river, it flows from Luton through north east London, and into the river Thames at Leamouth. All is not well with the Lea, as Simon Bamford, General Manager, of British Waterways (BW) in London, comments the …

“[water] quality on the River Lee Navigation has been an issue of concern for many years, affecting local residents, wildlife, boaters and other waterway users … “in hot weather the silt on the bottom of the river sometimes rises into huge slick's' which are both unsightly and smell foul.”

Forced removal - population displacements

East London faces the break up of the largest concentration of amateur football pitches in Europe (home to the Hackney and Leyton Sunday League), relocation of a local cycle track, running and walking routes. There will be displacement of other uses, including three Travellers' settlements, artists' studios, and Clays Lane Peabody Estate (formerly Clays Lane Housing Co-operative, now managed by Community Based Housing Association [CBHA]). Over 400 University of East London students, also based at Clays Lane, were evicted by the University in advance of the bid decision in July, many in the throes of their exams. The impact of relocation on firms in the Lower Lea Valley is considered in Section 2.2 below.

Wednesday evening brought bad news for the London Development Agency whose bid to acquire land related to the Olympics was turned down by planners at Waltham Forest Town Hall. The LDA was applying for planning permission for allotments on Marsh Lane Fields where they want to relocate the existing Manor Gardens allotments, currently located within the proposed Olympic Park.

Predictable practical problems with the Prescott Lock, compounded by financial conditions, are "making barge traffic unviable", it was reported at a November meeting of the Thames River Users Consultative Forum.

Olympics 2012 organisers have been forced to spell out their policy for treating photographers at the east London construction site after an amateur claimed security guards tried to stop him taking pictures there. Dr Patrick Green told us two security guards tried to prevent him taking pictures at the northern end of the 2012 Olympic site on Sunday 10 June.

A group of interested people from the Hackney Marsh Users group have been in contact with British Waterways recently to find out what their plans are to impound the tidal stretches of the River Lea.

“The Olympics will promote sport and healthy living in the capital,” it says the website of Waltham Forest borough council. “We can now look forward to seeing the area regenerate with the best sporting, leisure and cultural facilities the world has ever seen."

In preparation for the 2012 games, the recently much maligned Defra agencies – BritishWaterways, the Environment Agency and Natural England – are working together to develop the most sustainable waterway restoration project possible.