A first look inside the 2020 Olympic aquatics and volleyball arenas

Reuters - Construction at two Tokyo 2020 venues is nearing completion eight months from the start of the Olympics, as preparations for the Games enters the final stretch on schedule. The elegant Tokyo Aquatics Centre, which will host swimming and diving at the Games, is 90% complete, according to the Tokyo Metropolitan Government (TMG) and is on schedule to be finished at the end of February. Likewise, the venue for volleyball and wheelchair basketball at Tokyo 2020 is 98% finished with only the painting of the interior floor to be concluded. All of the venues being built or refurbished for Tokyo 2020 are on schedule, including the centerpiece National Stadium, where construction work finished last week. The Aquatics Centre, built at a cost of 56.7 billion yen (US$522.57 million), will be the last new venue to be completed. The swimming test event will take place at the Aquatics Centre on April 14-15. A feature running throughout many of the Tokyo 2020 venues is the use of wood. Ariake Arena, the volleyball venue, features 880 cubic meters of wood, mainly sourced from Japan, which is the most of any of the sites other than the National Stadium. After the Tokyo 2020 Games are over, the arena will be used for concerts and other cultural events.