Bristol Rovers’ £40m (US$62.2m, €56.4m) plan to move into a new stadium across the city has collapsed after supermarket chain Sainsbury’s won its High Court battle over the purchase of its current home. The initial plan had been for Sainsbury’s to buy the team’s 12,000-seat Memorial Stadium in 2011 and lease it back to the club while a new 21,700-seat stadium was developed in the north of Bristol. The supermarket

Tottenham Hotspur FC (THFC) will install an innovative multi-use pitch at its 61,000-capacity stadium in North London – allowing it to host a minimum of two National Football League (NFL) games each season. The club will use a retractable grass field at its new £400m venue – designed by sports architects Populous – with an artificial surface underneath that will be used for NFL games. The design will allow greater flexibility

Construction work on Zaha Hadid Architects’ Olympic stadium in Tokyo, Japan, is to begin in October, after the Japanese government confirmed the final details of the project. It will now cost US$2bn (€1.8bn, £1.3bn) to build – almost double the original estimate. Work is scheduled to be completed a few months later than planned, in May 2019, but still in time for the Rugby World Cup due to be held

Italian club AC Milan has been given the green light to build a new €330m (US$363m, £236m) stadium in the north of the city. The seven-time European football champions’ plans for a new 48,000-capacity stadium in the Portello region of Milan were approved by city administrators after a six-month long consultation period. Designed by sports architects Arup, the club has described the stadium as “the most innovative in the world”.

Chelsea Football Club (CFC) plans to replace its current stadium in south London with a 60,000-capacity landmark venue celebrating the heritage of sport in and around Stamford Bridge. The club has launched a three-day public consultation on the stadium plans, during which local residents will be able to view and offer their views on the proposals. The conceptual designs, which have been put on display at Stamford Bridge, pay homage

Seven-time Wimbledon tennis champion Roger Federer pitched up in South London, UK over the weekend to help launch sports goods giant Nike’s legacy project for this year’s Wimbledon tennis tournament. Nike has taken over four community tennis courts in Tanner Street Park, Bermondsey, investing £17,500 in resurfacing the ageing courts with a designer touch in pink and blue and setting up a branded tennis and activity hub. The NikeCourt Club

Leisure architecture projects from the likes of Foster + Partners, Zaha Hadid Architects, BIG and Populous have made the 2015 shortlist for the World Building of the Year. Organised by the World Architecture Festival, 338 projects in total have made the shortlist in a variety of categories, with both major international firms and smaller companies taking their place. There are entries included from 46 countries. Aside from the overall World

A museum celebrating the Olympic legacy of Brazil will open in Rio de Janeiro in time for next year’s 2016 Olympic and Paralympic Games. To be built on the Barra da Tijuca, just behind the location of the Athletes' Village, the development will tell the story of the Rio 2016 Games and the wider history of Brazil at the Olympics, Paralympics and Winter Olympics as part of the country’s legacy

As part of plans to make its new stadium among the most eco-friendly in the world, the Atlanta Falcons have unveiled plans to surround the venue with edible gardens. Apples, figs and berries are among the planned produce from the gardens, which will be irrigated by rainwater collected from a storm detention vault. Created by Atlanta-based urban designers HGOR, the gardens will feature raised beds at the southwest corner of

Italian football club AS Roma has submitted plans for one of the largest urban regeneration projects in the country for decades. The club’s €1.5bn (£1.1bn, US$1.7bn) plans for the Tor di Valle area in the Italian capital include the construction of a new 52,500 capacity stadium – expandable to 60,000 for major matches – surrounded by a sports, entertainment and commercial district covering 105 hectares (260 acres). The masterplan envisions

English Premier League (EPL) champion Chelsea FC will announce detailed plans to rebuild its Stamford Bridge stadium in London later this month. It is understood that Swiss-based architecture firm Herzog & de Meuron is working on the plans in partnership with London-based practice Lifschutz Davidson Sandilands. Despite being one of the most successful English clubs of the past decade, the club’s current home capacity of 41,000 is only the eighth

Orlando City Soccer Club (OCSC) plans to increase capacity at its new stadium – set to open in 2016 – to 28,000 due to an “overwhelming response to the club’s home games” during its first season in the Major Soccer League (MLS). Original designs for the US$100m stadium, created by US-based sports architects Populous, were for the stadium to host up to 19,000 fans. The club, however, currently has the

The £1bn (€1.3bn $1.42bn) Swansea Tidal Lagoon – an innovative renewable energy scheme which could also feature an oyster hatchery, restaurant, visitor centre and watersport centre – has taken a significant step forward after the UK government granted planning permission. Proposals from developer Tidal Lagoon Power (TLP) for the world’s first tidal lagoon to generate clean electricity are being masterplanned by LDA Design – the firm which also worked on

Hopkins Architects’ plans to build a new £1.75m (US$2.66m, €2.4m) pavilion at the historic Herne Hill Velodrome in London have been approved. The velodrome dates back to 1891 and is the last surviving venue from the 1948 Olympics, but the old pavilion had fallen into disrepair despite the track itself still being regularly used. Local councillors unanimously voted in favour of the new plans to regenerate the velodrome, where Olympic

Plans have been revealed for a massive surf park development in Austin, Texas, with the first waves set to break at the facility in 2016. The development will be the first in North America. The developer behind the project is NLand Surf Park, led by founder and CEO Doug Coors of the Coors brewing family and backed by Colorado-based 9th Street Capital. The 12-acre (48,500sq m) wave pool will be

Stadium redevelopment plans laid out by architects Populous for newly-promoted League One football team Southend United are imminent, according to the Englieh seaside town’s Council leader, Ron Woodley. The £80m (US$122m, €111.4m) redevelopment, tentatively known as Fossetts Farm Stadium, includes a £25m (US$38m, €38m) 22,000-seat stadium, a 12-screen multiplex cinema, a hotel and retail park, and a 13-storey tower block comprised of 170 apartments. The futuristic-looking stadium will also be

Experience designers BRC Imagination Arts are introducing a ‘game-changing’ fan experience to the world of sports attractions. The Selig Experience exhibit honours retiring Major League Baseball (MLB) commissioner and former Milwaukee Brewers owner, Allan ‘Bud’ Selig. Opened at Miller Park – the home of the Brewers – the experience features a multimedia presentation telling the story of Selig’s role in saving MLB in Milwaukee, his efforts to bring the Brewers

Herzog & de Meuron’s 42,000-seat football stadium in Bordeaux, France, has been completed – with Zinedine Zidane the guest of honour at its inaugural match. Delivered on time and on budget, Nouveau Stade de Bordeaux has been designed to appear 'light and open', according to the Swiss architects. Grand staircases blur the boundaries between the inside and outside, while 900 white columns guide visitors on their way in and out

Architectural practice BIG has completed the second phase of a project at Gammel Hellerup High School, Copenhagen, Denmark – the old high school of founding partner Bjarke Ingels. The new addition, a 1,400sq m (15,069sq ft) arts and culture building, follows the completion of a multi-purpose sports hall in 2013, which paid homage to Ingels’ old maths teacher by using the mathematical formula for a ballistic arc – the flight path

Qatari officials are looking into the possibility of building a first-of-its-kind underwater TV studio for use during the 2022 World Cup, with the intention of converting it into an aquarium attraction after the event. Patric Douglas, CEO of artificial reef and aquarium design firm Reef Worlds, says the company is creating plans for a US$30m (€27m, £19.3m) underwater broadcast studio on the ocean floor. Douglas added that Qatar World Cup

Inspired by the movement of athletes, New York-based Diller Scofidio + Renfro has revealed its preliminary designs for the United States Olympic Museum. According to partner Elizabeth Diller, the museum – which will be located in Colorado Springs – “spirals up and outwards from a central atrium, drawing the public in at its base and propelling them up through the galleries”. She said the building would be “expressed in two

Los Angeles Football Club (LAFC) has announced plans to build one of the most expensive privately financed soccer-specific stadiums in the US. Designed by L.A.-based architects Gensler, the $250m (£160m) downtown stadium is set to become the first open-air professional sports arena in the city since baseball's Dodger Stadium opened in 1962. LAFC, which will enter Major League Soccer (MLS) as an expansion team in 2018, revealed designs for a

LDA Design has been selected to masterplan a university campus at London’s Olympic Park, featuring a museum, collections libraries and performance spaces. A team led by the practice, which also includes Nicholas Hare Architects, will develop the 125,000sq m (1,345,489sq ft) campus for University College London (UCL), called UCL East. It will be located south of the ArcelorMittal Orbit and the Zaha Hadid-designed London Aquatics Centre at the Queen Elizabeth

HOK has signed a groundbreaking, multi-year partnership with North America-based United Soccer League (USL). The deal will see the global architects conduct a stadium development, design and standards programme, supporting the league’s strategic initiative to house all USL clubs in soccer-specific stadiums across US and Canada by 2020. As the league’s official stadium design partner, HOK will apply its venue design expertise to guide soccer-specific stadium development for expansion clubs

Guy Hollaway architects have revealed plans for a unique, multi-level skate park to draw international skaters and spectators to Folkestone, UK. The plans outline a 1,000sq m (10,700sq ft) three-storey skate park for the seaside town in the south east of England, the first multi-story facility of its kind. The sports park will also host a variety of popular urban sports including skateboarding, BMX-ing, rollerblading and scootering, with additional trial

Four companies have made it on to a short list of potential operators for a new AU$1bn (€706m, US$795m, £508m) stadium in Perth, Australia. One of the quartet – AEG Ogden, Nationwide Venue Management, Perth Stadium Management and Stadium Australia Operations – will be selected to manage the 60,000-capacity Perth Stadium, a multi-purpose stadium which will form the centrepiece of a new sporting precinct at Perth’s Burswood district. Due to

Plans to redevelop two existing stadiums in Sydney, Australia could be scrapped and replaced by a scheme to build two new major venues – at double the cost. The New South Wales (NSW) state government had previously earmarked AU$600m from the sale of the state's electricity assets in order to upgrade the city’s two major sporting venues – the ANZ Stadium and Allianz Stadium. But rather than redeveloping the two