Building Beijing's slide and joy

The 2022 Olympics will make use of 26 competition and non-competition venues in Beijing's downtown, Yanqing and co-host city Zhangjiakou in Hebei province.

Li Xinggang, chief architect of the entire Yanqing cluster, contends the sliding center is probably the most difficult project of all the new facilities for the Games, given China's lack of expertise in bobsledding and the environmental challenges posed.

"Design-wise, it's probably the most challenging one in Winter Olympics history because it must have all the functionalities of a world-class sporting venue but also with minimal disturbance to nature", said Li, of China Architecture Design and Research Group.

To do that, engineers must rigorously survey the landscape, create parts that best suit the environment and assemble them on site, said Li, adding that unnecessary facilities will be dismantled for recycling or reuse after the Olympics to restore the original ecology.

As a permanent venue, the sliding center will be utilized as a training base for the Chinese national teams after the Games and it will also bid to host more international competitions.