What is the temperature at the stadium zenith arena. How the Zenith football stadium is being converted into an ice arena. What people said
The stadium on Krestovsky Island is the most ridiculous construction project in the history of modern Russia.
Events from the biography of this unfortunate arena can be retold endlessly - it will be both embarrassing and funny.
How it all began
I remember very well how Valentina Matvienko (then governor) first announced the super-modern stadium to be built in St. Petersburg.
Imagine this was in April 2005. 12 years ago.
Initially, the arena was supposed to cost 7 billion rubles. Even this amount caused the most severe condemnation among those who always say that money should be given to pensioners, doctors and teachers.
If these people knew what the final cost would be, they would give up social activities and go to the monastery.
10 Amazing Facts
So, the stadium on Krestovsky was built for more than 10 years. During this time:
1. The price tag has grown from 7 billion rubles to 43 billion rubles. Before the change in course, the arena was worth more than a billion dollars.
At the same time, the capacity increased from 50 thousand (the first project) to 68 thousand (finally).
2. Deadlines have been pushed back dozens of times. For example, in January 2006, the head of the St. Petersburg Sports Committee, Vyacheslav Chazov, said that he was 1,000,000% sure that in 2009 Zenit would move to a new stadium.
The official was wrong by only 8 years. And there were many such pseudo-prophetic quotes - all by.
3. Three contractor companies were put on trial. Some overestimated the cost by 500 million rubles, others requisitioned almost 400 million, and others grabbed advances for 148 million without providing anything in return.
The main hell: money for the stadium was taken from the budgets of St. Petersburg schools and kindergartens.
4. Stadium architect Kise Kurokawa dies.
“He did not leave detailed drawings - this dragged on time and led to a rise in the price of the stadium. The crisis of 2008 led to an increase in prices. It will be one of the most expensive stadiums in the world. St. Petersburg is one of the most beautiful cities in the world, so the stadium should also be good,” said Senator Vadim Tyulpanov.
Unfortunately, Tyulpanov himself also did not live to see the first match at Krestovsky - a couple of weeks before the game, he slipped unsuccessfully in the bathhouse and died.
5. The stadium did not pass the FIFA commission. In 2009 officials from football organization arrived at the construction site, studied the arena and concluded: the multibillion-dollar project does not meet football standards. I had to fix everything.
6. Plastic chairs lay under the film for years. They were cleared by customs, brought to the facility, but there was nowhere to install them. Now they are forever dirty: they do not get dirty, but they look like collective farms.
7. Builders went on strike due to the fact that they were stupidly not paid for two months. Most likely, their money spread into other people's pockets.
8. It turned out that the retractable field vibrates- because of this, it is impossible to play football on it. Again, I had to redo it.
9. It turned out that even after the official completion of construction, the stadium is still not ready. For example, it does not have a retractable roof. For all sorts of improvements, Gazprom (already Gazprom, not the city) will spend more than 6 billion rubles in total.
10. Full-time agronomists scored on the field– now Zenit employees take care of the grass. The lawn is still in a terrible state, but it was impossible to pull: in the summer, the arena on Krestovsky is supposed to host the Confederations Cup, so it needed to be tested in combat conditions.
What do they say in St. Petersburg about this shame?
I wrote my first text about the nightmares of the Krestovsky stadium in 2012, five years ago.
Even then, it all looked like a farce and a tragicomedy.
Journalists from sports publications regularly came from Moscow: they were taken on a tour of the arena and convinced that everything would be fine. They said that the land was not the right one, the builders were lazy, the suppliers let us down - and if it were not for spontaneous circumstances, everything would have been built long ago.
I did not believe in these stories: I even developed immunity to the new stadium and the dough pumped into it.
Then I began to avoid news about the object, because it was simply embarrassing for the city, and specifically for those who allowed it.
At some point, I even resigned myself and thought that Zenit would continue to play at the small Petrovsky, and the construction of the stadium on Krestovsky would be interrupted and left as a monument. A monument to corruption, as Mikhail Boyarsky rightly noted.
Fortunately, the arena is still completed. But I kept seeing notes about a leaky roof, a squalid lawn, and other force majeure, so I didn't really want to go to the opening.
As a result, my friends still persuaded me to buy a ticket for a historic match, and we went to the game between Zenit and Ural.
Where is the stadium for 43 billion?
To be honest, I have never met such strange logistics anywhere as on Krestovsky.
Fans have two options. The first is to get to the metro station "Petrogradskaya", take a free bus, sit in it for 15 minutes and get off one and a half kilometers from the stadium. This distance must be covered on foot.
The second option is to immediately get to the Krestovsky Ostrov metro station and stomp through the park for 2 kilometers.
They were not allowed to use private transport - only like this, in a hardcore way. Apparently, they were guided by the owners of fitness bracelets and sports applications.
The weather was terrible, but we still decided that it was wiser to get to Krestovsky and walk from there.
How did we get there?
The walk through the park took 25 minutes.
Here it is worth saying that only 20 thousand spectators were allowed to the first game (with a capacity of 68 thousand), so as not to overload the arena. In general, there were no crowds in the park. 20 thousand is not that much.
There was a slight crush at the stadium, which from the outside resembled a spaceship from Bondarchuk's film.
During the inspection, we were treated extremely humanely: they barely touched me, and my friends did not even open my backpack.
On the other hand, the guy who was following us was scoffed from head to toe. “I won’t go here anymore, so as not to endure humiliation,” he muttered. I don't know what is the reason for such a selective approach during the examination.
We climbed the stairs, quickly showed the stewards the tickets and immediately got to the podium.
What did you like?
1. The temperature in the stadium. The roof is slammed shut, so the arena is warm but not stuffy. At Petrovsky, we would have to sit in two sweaters, a down jacket and underpants, but here we went in ordinary sweaters, without outerwear.
2. Visibility. Unlike Petrovsky, there are no running tracks between the field and the stands, so the players are much closer to the audience than at the old stadium.
3. Space in front of the sector. You can go out in a couple of minutes, go to the toilet (there are a lot of them, they are not bad) or run to the buffet (there, unfortunately, there is a tiny assortment).
4. Work of stewards. Everyone smiled at us, treated us very politely, answered any questions. It can be seen that the guys were instructed before international cup Confederations.
5. Scoreboard. Very large, high quality, everything is clearly visible.
6. Boyarsky as an announcer. Extremely cheerful for his age. Once he even shouted "Canal!"
What didn't you like?
1. Too many stairs and not enough elevators. It’s not difficult for me to go up or down, but for the elderly, even two spans is a test.
2. Monstrous cell signal. Either zero circles and “No network”, or one circle and, in fact, also “No network”. You can easily lose your child and not get through to him.
Then I asked my colleagues from the press box for the Wi-Fi password - there the speed also floundered at the bottom.
3. In the buffet - only sausages in dough for 200 rubles. Fatty in every sense.
4. Colleagues from the sports media said that the upper tier (they didn’t let him in) was not specifically completed. There is construction debris lying around, everything is covered in dust, ceilings are leaking here and there. We need to do something about this sooner.
5. Dirty lawn. The people who were in charge of the grass didn't give a damn about it so much that the whole field turned out to be uneven, bald and just ugly. This is a failure.
6. Leaking roof of the stadium. No comments. Let those who have no conscience to hand over an unfinished object speak.
7. Weak acoustics. The fans are trying, screaming, but they are barely audible. It is not clear why this is so.
What about football?
Zenit played absolutely mediocre, but in the middle of the second half, the referee removed two Ural players in a controversial situation. Apparently, he did not want to spoil the debut.
Pitertsy put the squeeze on and scored one goal in the 86th minute. By this time, all adequate people began to worry about the guests, who courageously defended themselves.
Then another person was removed from Ural, and the team from Yekaterinburg was left with eight.
The game ended with the release of "Zenith" three of us on one goalkeeper of the guests - of course, the favorites scored the second goal.
2:0, super scandalous victory for the hosts.
What did people say?
We walked back through the park in a slow crowd. Most of the fans discussed not the stadium, but refereeing. Everyone agreed that it was a shame to win like that.
Regarding the stadium, the opinion is also more or less homogeneous: the arena is definitely not worth 43 billion, but it’s nice to be inside. Certainly more pleasant than on the blown and outdated Petrovsky.
It is curious that those spectators who went to the old stadium. I asked the Moscow journalists - their arena on Krestovsky was absolutely not impressive.
They say that Krasnodar and Spartak are better.
But in St. Petersburg they are satisfied: we are convinced that it is still possible to play football on our long-term construction, and this is the most important thing.
And yet: cool or not?
In Munich Bayern's stadium is clearly better than now at Zenith.
Spartak Arena- the same level.
In Amsterdam- a little more convenient than on Krestovsky.
In Stockholm much worse than ours.
Olympic Stadium in Turin- many times worse than in St. Petersburg.
True, all these stadiums were built for sane money. And ours is for space.
Only two and a half months remain before the start of the main football festival of this year - the final part of the World Cup, the matches of which will be held in 11 cities of Russia. One of the host cities will be St. Petersburg. The brand new St. Petersburg arena will host four matches group stage, as well as one game each of the 1/8 and 1/2 finals and the match for third place - a total of seven meetings.
The friendly match between the national teams of Russia and France has become another training session for all services that ensure order and security during the event. The journalist of our editorial board visited the game as an ordinary spectator and offers some advice to those who have not been to the stadium yet, but are going to the next matches of the Russian Championship or World Cup games.
Tip one: think over the route to the stadium and back in advance
St. Petersburg Stadium (informally Zenit-Arena or Krestovsky) is located in the western part of Krestovsky Island at Football Alley, 1. There are several ways to get to the stadium. I would like to say right away that it is most convenient to approach the object on foot. The easiest option is to get to the Krestovsky Ostrov metro station and walk 2.5 kilometers directly through the park along Batareynaya Road. From the metro station to the stadium, the walk will take 25-30 minutes.
Another option is suitable if you visit the Piterland shopping mall, built on the edge of the mainland of the Primorsky district. There are buses to the shopping center from the Staraya Derevnya and Chyornaya Rechka metro stations. It is not very convenient to get to Piterland itself, but the walk from it to the stadium through the pedestrian Yacht Bridge will take about 20 minutes.
On the days of the matches, the arena can also be reached by free buses, which are commonly called "shuttles". They run for two hours before the start of the game in the direction of Krestovsky Island and for two hours after it ends. "Shuttles" allow to avoid transport collapse after the match, when the work of the Krestovsky Ostrov metro station is temporarily limited. Free buses transport thousands of spectators to the Chkalovskaya metro station. On the day of the match, several dozen shuttles ran between Russia and France. Their stops are located near the Vyborgskaya (red line), Petrogradskaya (blue line) and Chkalovskaya (purple line) metro stations.
Of course, you can also get to the place by private car, but it will be difficult to do this. On the adjacent territory there are paid two-level covered parkings encircling the stadium from south to north, but there are no free ones. Paid parking allows you to leave your vehicle near the arena, and the journey from the car to the fan's seat will take from 5 to 15 minutes. Only for paid parking you need to purchase a subscription in advance either at the sales office or through the official website of FC Zenit. Currently, tickets cannot be purchased through the website. Apparently they are all sold out. However, it is not necessary to drive directly to the stadium. If you try, you can leave the car in the eastern part of Krestovsky Island and walk 3-4 kilometers on foot in 40-45 minutes.
Tip Two: Check out the list of prohibited items
During World Cup matches, all passage zones must operate, but the flow of people to the 68,000-seat stadium will be large every time. At Zenit matches alone, there were sold-outs several times. The passage area with frames is preceded by a labyrinth constructed from metal fences. To save space, it is advisable not to take backpacks and bulky bags with you. In addition, in the absence of hand luggage, you can avoid several nervous minutes of interrogation by a security officer who will definitely ask you to show its contents. You can still save a minute or two if you immediately take it out of your pockets before passing through the control frame mobile phone and other metal objects.
During the matches of the Confederations Cup-2017, which became a rehearsal for the home World Cup, the press service of its organizing committee published a list of items prohibited in the arenas. Krestovsky was also among the host stadiums, so the restrictions apply to it as well. As a result, the following items are not allowed to be brought to matches: food and drinks, liquids in containers larger than 100 ml, thermoses and flasks, pyrotechnics, perfumes and powder boxes, any sports equipment and folded umbrellas larger than 25 cm. A separate list is professional audio, photo and video equipment: voice recorders, photo and video cameras, tripods, drones and even selfie sticks.
Remember: the sooner you pass through the security checkpoint, the more nerves you will save yourself and the employee working at the stadium. And let other fans who are nervously queuing behind you pass faster.
Tip Three: Eat a Big Eat Before a Game
As we have already found out, food and liquids whose volume exceeds 100 ml cannot be brought into the stadium. Of course, you can try to put a Snickers or other energy bar in your pocket, but once in a while you don’t have to, they can take it away. The most correct solution in this situation is to eat a hearty meal before advancing to the match. If a bright game awakens an appetite, then at Krestovsky during a break you can look into one of the six food shops located along the stands.
Prices by the standards of an ordinary Petrozavodsk resident, of course, bite: 100 rubles for half a liter of water and any other drink, and 150-300 rubles per unit for various snacks. The menu offers a choice of ordinary fast food, such as burgers or rolls. Since the days of Petrovsky, many fans have fallen in love with buying hot corn, they also sell it at the Zenit Arena. A moment of celebration: with food bought at the stadium, you can go up to the podium, only before attentive stewards will ask you to pour the liquid from the bottle into the cardboard glass that comes with the drink.
Tip #4: Think About Clothes
The case when you want to warn not that there is a "dubak" at the stadium. On the contrary, the stadium of FC Zenit is very warm even in winter due to the covered roof. It felt like it was about +15 degrees at the end of March on the field and in the stands. The intensity of passions on the lawn during the match between Russia and France did not happen, but it was still warm and comfortable in the fan's chair.
Video
At the St. Petersburg stadium, the roof is retractable, so in the summer, if the weather is good, it is opened so that the audience does not suffocate, and closed during rain and wind. It's funny that the roof has its own Twitter account with a 1,500 audience. The roof informs whether it will be closed or not.
Tip five: don't slow down - and there will be no problems
The last tip summarizes all the previous ones. If you calculate possible scenarios in advance and assess the risks, then there should not be any difficulties during the trip. There are a lot of negative comments on the Internet about the poor organization of work at the entrance and exit from the stadium, but most people interfere with themselves.
The game between Russia and France was attended by 51,165 spectators. Of course, if all the people gather for the game at the last moment, then pandemonium will not be avoided. Therefore, the entrance to the stands usually opens two hours before the start of matches. Another thing is that this match was held on a weekday, and most of the spectators barely made it to the stadium by 19:00, given the realities of St. Petersburg transport.
The bus with fans from Petrozavodsk arrived an hour before the start of the game, half an hour the majority managed to reach the arena at a fast pace and in 15-20 minutes pass all the entrances without any problems. At the exit from the stadium, in order to avoid the crowd, it was necessary to go to the middle or far stairs, because the main flow of people always chooses the nearest descent. By the way, this was announced by the volunteers, who constantly repeated into the megaphone the instructions for leaving the arena and leaving Krestovsky Island.
Remember: everything is in your hands. To really enjoy football, you need not only a great game on the field, but also a little self-organization and discipline. Situations are different. You should not always hope for a good organization, there are always emergency situations. If they are foreseen, then in many cases they can be overlooked or mitigated.
In a week, the football stadium "Zenith" should turn into ice arena for two hockey games. Fontanka tells how this unprecedented process for urban sports takes place.
Mikhail Ognev/Fontanka.ru
Work, as promised earlier by the vice-president of the FHR and SKA Roman Rotenberg, began almost simultaneously with the final whistle of the Zenit-Rubin match on December 9. The field was rolled out into the street, and in its place, the installation of a hockey rink and temporary stands began.
Football turf safe
Behind football lawn no need to worry. As the agronomists of the stadium say, for the grass to be on fresh air even better: there it grows in comfortable, more natural conditions. To save the lawn, heating, lamps and a protective coating are used.
The installation process of the ice box is laborious. First, a special substrate was laid on the concrete slab, which remained after the lawn was pulled out, and cooling equipment was installed. And only then did they start laying the ice. It was necessary to achieve a certain thickness of ice (at least 5 centimeters) and quality. The first layers of the future skating rink were poured using ordinary fire hoses. Meanwhile, a lot of other work is going on around: installing stands, stages for artists to perform, and replacing football banners and signs with hockey ones. Rubber mats were laid in the locker rooms so that hockey players could move comfortably and safely on skates.
Cocktail ice for hockey
Everything that is being done now at the Gazprom Arena is being done for the first time. No one has ever mounted an ice box in a stadium with a roll-out field. The organizers say that there were some technical difficulties, but they have already been successfully overcome. There is no doubt that the stadium will be ready to host a full house for the match on December 16.
Now the installation of the hockey rink is underway. The other day they brought two trucks of real cocktail ice to speed up the pouring process. From above it was filled with water. Already now the ice is smooth enough to skate on it.
As mentioned earlier, both hockey matches will be held under a closed roof. The average temperature at the stadium will be about 15 degrees, and directly at the hockey rink itself - about +10, so that the ice does not start to melt. Therefore, dressing, especially the audience from the front rows, still needs to be warmer. Additional stands at the hockey box are designed for 7-9 thousand seats. Between the matches on December 16 and 22, the ice will be maintained. You only have to cut off the top layer of ice to change the banners on the playground, but it's still easier than building a skating rink from scratch.
One of the most common problems in such matches is fog. This potential issue is being prepared separately. During the games, the playground will be blown with special installations. Ventilation should also help.
Under the roof, a goal determination system is mounted, which in hockey, unlike football, has long been a common thing. A total of eight additional cameras are being installed. Unfortunately, there will be no spider camera that gives a spectacular picture from above. Fontanka explained this by the fact that there are so many additional structures on the roof. However technical possibility there is for this.
hockey festival
Before hockey matches will be held many different entertainment events under the general name Hockey Classic Fest. The entire match on December 16 and everything that will happen around it will be dedicated to the 100th anniversary of the birth of the legendary Soviet coach Anatoly Tarasov. The organizers did not reveal all the cards, but it is known for sure that there will be an exhibition dedicated to the coach.
Also on this day, the groups "Mumiy Troll" and "Gems" will perform. At the match on December 22, a concert by Grigory Leps is expected. There will be autograph sessions with hockey players. On December 16, the Russian national team will play in a special retro uniform, stylized as the uniform of the 50s. December 22 SKA too
We can already say for sure that the match on December 16 will be held with a full house. About 60,000 tickets were sold for the Russia-Finland game. The remaining tickets, with a planned capacity of about 70,000 spectators, are tickets distributed under partner and social programs. On December 22, there are still tickets available for free sale.
Artem Kuzmin, Fontanka.ru
Roman Moon watched the first show at the new arena in St. Petersburg.
Three hours before the start of the test opening, the new stadium in St. Petersburg is already full of people. True, many simply thought that everything would start earlier: the time was not very clear on the arena website. There were many complaints about his work, starting with the fact that as soon as the acceptance of applications for free tickets began.
The stadium itself also has problems with the name. Guys with mouthpieces stood at the entrance and urged to get tickets from the bags in advance in order to “go to the Zenit Arena” without any problems. The journalists were handed out leaflets with the name "Saint-Petersburg Stadium". At the same time, the stadium has recently been officially called the St. Petersburg Arena. So it will be called when Zenit plays the first matches there in the spring. So it will be called during the Confederations Cup. Only after that, a vote will be held in the city, as a result of which a permanent sign will be chosen.
The opinion of those who came to the opening of the stadium: it's good that this construction is over, it's bad that the stadium cost so much money.
Gennady
– New stadium looks good. "Petrovsky", of course, is a legend of St. Petersburg, but it is small for such a city and a team. It's good that it was built in the end. Does it bother you that it takes so long and so much money? Confuses. Especially money.
Boris
– Appearance- this is one thing, but you have to go there and look. There after all, they say, the platform does not work. Vibrates, does not meet European standards. I'm going to jump now. If I don’t fly into the ceiling, I’ll say that you can play. But 50 billion is wrong. In Europe, several stadiums would have been made for this money. I think this is a terrible loss for the state. I know that another 500 people will be imprisoned, will receive a life sentence for this stadium, but that will be later. The championship will pass, everything will calm down, people will be put in jail.
Alexey and Irina
- We are glad that it was built, but it was not worth the time and money spent. We have not gone to Zenit before, but there was this “First Visitor” campaign, we wanted to be the first. And we are absolutely not interested in football, we just wanted to see what was inside.
At the entrance my bag was enlightened.
“The bag must be searched,” the X-ray operator said to the guards standing nearby.
“Here you go,” they replied.
- This is not in my competence - again the operator.
Everyone was silent, the stadium workers tried not to look at each other. The pause dragged on.
“Maybe I should just go? I asked.
- So go.
Went inside. I probably don’t understand something in the decoration of such premises, but there are suspicions that the inside of the object for 43 billion should look somehow different.
If you go down several flights of stairs to the toilets, for some reason there are very low ceilings.
Food vendor tables look like this. I really want them to look different when football starts here.
But they make cotton candy - it seems that this was not the case at Petrovsky.
But even here there were problems: in the catering area, shortly before the start of the ceremony, the electricity was turned off.
At some point, a security guard came up and forbade me to take pictures without explaining the reasons. I had to go to the arena.
The scale of the new arena after the modest Petrovsky is impressive, but the stadium still looks inferior - there is no green lawn. The roll-out field was not shown today, reasonably believing that the motor show would kill it. But the curator Igor Albin said that they found out at the construction site how much money is needed so that the field no longer vibrates.
- Now we consider the cost of work to eliminate vibration. All within the estimate of the stadium. Additional costs will not be required. The cost is about 120 million rubles. Total cost? Approximately 43 billion rubles.
The temperature inside the stadium is about +10 degrees (it was -7 outside). Toward the end of the show, it became cold again, but after the hellish dubak at the winter Petrovsky, it's still very cool.
The famous retractable roof has not yet been opened.
Legendary chairs that were brought to the stadium in some ancient times.
And these are the screens of the new stadium in St. Petersburg.
Those who wish can compare them with the screens of the Krasnodar stadium:
The most dramatic jamb of the organizers is connected with the screens: when the video timer, counting down the time before the ceremony, reached zero, the time was reset to the mark of “2 hours and 20 minutes”. There was laughter and outraged cries, but, fortunately, it was just a small glitch in the system.
The three main moments of the central event of Saturday - the show itself:
Exit Vyacheslav Malafeev. The goalkeeper regretted that he would not play at the new stadium, and stated that he had never played at the stadium,.
The stunt guy flew off from the car, ran after her, but did not have time: she flew into the operator's tripod.
Bear on a bike. How appropriate, everyone decides for himself.
Judging by the reaction in social networks, the show seemed boring to people (about half of the audience left without waiting for the end), but no one has big complaints - the performance was free. Moreover, the hosts of the ceremony tried very hard (who were helped by really excellent acoustics):
- Friends, I think everyone knows about in large numbers jokes about construction, about construction time. Today, to all the jokes and demotivators walking around the network, I want to answer: “I did the job - walk boldly. Built, built and finally built
The people, ten minutes ago clapping even to Governor Poltavchenko, did not react.
We also touched on the topic of the uniqueness of St. Petersburg.
– We are with you in one of the most beautiful cities not only in Russia, but in the whole planet. We are proud that we are Petersburgers, we are proud that we live in this unique, beautiful city. And today this city has made such a chic PO-DA-ROCK.
They also reminded about one of the main matches in the history of St. Petersburg football.
- In 1907, the first match between St. Petersburg and Moscow took place. Who do you think won? Petersburg defeated Moscow 5:4.
Everyone I talked to before the ceremony started said that the stadium was not worth the money.
Everyone I spoke to afterward was ecstatic. For example:
It is clear why many Zenit fans were stunned: after a cozy, but small and cold Petrovsky new arena really impressive scale. It is also clear that Saturday's event is a test event, small jambs are the norm. And that almost all the current problems of the new stadium can be solved: clean the seats, work on decorating the premises behind the stands, move the lawn, and all this will make the arena a hundred times more photogenic and comfortable.
The main thing is that this happens not in 10 years, but a little faster.
Photo: RIA Novosti / Alexey Danichev (1,4,18); Roman Moon
