Doha has approached contractors for the first of the venues it plans to build as part of its bid to host the Olympic Games in 2020.

The move comes as delegates from the Doha 2020 Olympic Committee travelled to the International Olympic Committee (IOC) headquarters in Lausanne to submit the city’s application on 13 February. Senior figures from the committee provided more details of the city’s bid in a webcast on 20 February.

In addition to revealing that Qatar would bid to host the games in October, to ensuring favourable weather conditions, the committee outlined some of the key technical aspects of the bid, including plans for new infrastructure.

Fahad Juma, deputy chief executive officer and technical director of the bid committee, explained 35 per cent of the venues required to host the games already exist, while 56 per cent of the competition sites are already planned and budgeted for in Qatar’s 2030 Vision plan. Doha has already invited contractors to express interest in one of the planned venues.  

Meanwhile in Doha, the Qatar Olympic Committee (QOC) has invited contractors to express interest (EOI) in construction contracts for a new venue at the Al-Sadd sports club. The multi-purpose sports hall will be designed for basketball, volleyball, handball, badminton and gymnastics, with a total seating capacity of 7,500. The hall will have a total built-up area of 52,200 square metres and will consist of five levels and basement car parking.

The two packages are for enabling works and main building works and site infrastructure.

Contractors were asked to submit EOIs by 21 February for the enabling package and 26 February for the main construction tender.

In addition to the main arena, the sports centre will contain a medical centre, physiotherapy centres, massage rooms, a gymnasium and an anti-doping test area. The hall will also contain two warm up areas, each with a capacity of 250 seats. The facility will be designed and constructed according to the international standards for hosting Olympic Games.

The client is scheduled to award the contract for the enabling works package in May and excavation works are expected to be completed by the end of 2012.  For the main building contract, the QOC is planning to award the contract by the end of October, with the project scheduled for completion in 2014.

The Al-Sadd sports club is located close to the Al-Waab intersection in Doha

In its bid proposal, Qatar outlined other plans for new sports facilities that will be built in five connected zones, symbolising the Olympic rings. The central games zone, which would be located at Qatar University, would contain the athlete training facilities and the media centre. The Doha Olympic Park, north of the university, would contain the Lusail National Stadium and would host archery and aquatic events.

The Aspire zone would host athletics, boxing and water polo. The Education City zone would hold the equestrian events and the preliminary football matches. The final zone, the Waterpark zone, would be located next to the existing airport and will host the swimming and sailing events.

The QOC says Doha will have 60,000 hotel rooms by 2020, with 50,000 of those located within 15km of the event venues. About $50bn-worth of transport infrastructure projects will be completed in time for the games.

With its wealth of energy reserves, Qatar is confident that funding the facilities required for the event will not be difficult.

“Qatar’s geography is blessed in terms of natural resources, which gives us a base to build the economy,” says Sheikh Saoud bin Abdulrahman al-Thani, vice-chairman of the Doha 2020 Olympic Committee. “With this we can guarantee successful delivery of facilities and infrastructure.”

To win the right to host the event, Doha face competition from Istanbul, Tokyo, Baku and Madrid, the other four countries bidding for the 2020 games. The IOC will elect the winning bid for the 2020 games in September 2013.

Doha will be hoping that its bid to host the Olympic Games will be successful after it won the right to host football’s World Cup in 2022.The Gulf state has pledged to build nine new stadiums and complete upwards of $60bn of infrastructure schemes in the run up to the event.