Sports Hub Bidders Come Out With Innovative Funding Models

Source : Channel NewsAsia, 06 November 2007

The people behind the various proposals for the Singapore Sports Hub want to make it a place every Singaporean, young and old, wants to head to.

Besides big names such as tennis sensation Maria Sharapova that could draw crowds to the place, all three bidders know the sports hub should be for all Singaporeans to enjoy and use in order to ensure the long-term success of the project.

The bidders have proposed various schemes in which substantial amounts will be set aside to fund events at the Sports Hub.

"A lot of events… are not profit making. They are loss making, but they are extremely important for the community in Singapore, and they are extremely important to encourage a healthy nation, a healthy lifestyle, extremely important to encourage grassroots participation in sports," said Neil Arora from Singapore Gold Consortium.

Singapore Sports Hub Group's proposal

"What we have done is to set up a Premier Park Foundation which really looks to reinvest the bulk of our commercial revenues that we will earn from Premier Park back into the project. At this moment, we have calculated that up to about 75 per cent of the commercial revenues earned from the park will be (reinvested) into the project to ensure that the programming content is sustainable over the long term," said Lynn Tho from Singapore Sports Hub Consortium.

The sports hub project is also unique as it is the largest sports infrastructure built on a public and private partnership basis.

"A lot of governments around the world are finding that allowing these sorts of facilities to be social infrastructure facilities… managed by private enterprise can be a more efficient way of doing things. And that's certainly the arguments that are being put in Australia and the UK," said Alpine Mayreder Consortium’s Stephen McMillan.

Alpine Mayreder's proposal

The Singapore Sports Hub, to be finished in 2011, will be built, owned and operated by the winning consortium.

All three bidders have included about 40,000 square metres of retail space in their designs. - CNA/ac