Emergency work to address the leaking cantilever, which covers the grandstand at the National Stadium, needs to be done ahead of the eight staging of the Jamaica International Invitational track meet next month, says the KSAC.

That is but one of the initial recommendations from deputy KSAC mayor Lee Clarke, who conducted a two-hour inspection of the 48-year-old facility yesterday along with members of ODPEM, the Jamaica Fire Brigade and the Public Health Authority of the Ministry of Health.

“They are cracks there that needs to be repaired and from both engineers councilor (Trevor) Bernard and (City Engineer) Mr (Norman) Shand… the roof is an emergency situation that must be repaired because the water leaks through the roof, and it boils down to a lack of maintenance over the years,” Clarke told the Observer, indicating that yesterday’s inspection of the facility, was the second one in the last four months.

“We have another meet coming up on May 1, so before that some things have to be done. We’re going to have some quick days work coming up,” he added.

Clarke, who chairs the KSAC’s Building Town Planning Committee, said that the initial assessment prior to receiving reports from the respective agencies in 48 hours, is that the integrity of the structure seems to be okay.

“On this tour, we introduced the new Schmitt Measuring (Systems) machine for integrity and so fort of the structure… from what we have seen, that is in order,” he said, noting that other areas which could endanger lives need to be addressed.

“It will cost some good money… like the electricity, emergency stairs and so forth… some cracks that the engineer identified need to be repaired,” Clarke added.

General manager of Independence Park Limited, Major Desmon Brown, whose company has responsibility for the National Stadium, is recommending that the government look to build a new facility in addition to carrying out minor repair work on the existing structure.

“There are a number of issues that a modern stadium requires and we share that with the ODPEM, the Mayor’s office and everybody. What we have to decide is do we spend more money to fix this stadium? In fact I don’t think it can be fixed, I think it can be knocked down and rebuilt here. Or do we look at another location? Brown said, repeating the suggestion that Caymanas lands in St Catherine would be ideal for such a development.

“We also need a slightly larger stadium, properly covered… I’m suggesting between 45 and 50 thousand seats, and for that you’re going to need at least 10,000 parking as we don’t have that space here. If you fix this (National Stadium), you will still have the parking problems, you’ll still have the problems with the surrounding areas,” he added.

Brown said it could cost approximately US$240 to build a new stadium in a three-year period.

“Right now we have more bathrooms in the grandstand than in the bleachers and we have 5,000 (seats) in the grandstand and 23,000 (seats) in the bleachers, so that needs to change and we’re working on that. Modern stadiums should have access to the complete stadium in a service tunnel, we don’t have that,” he added.

“Our concession areas are inadequate, especially to the bleachers, so all of those areas (need addressing),” the IPL boss said, noting that approximately US$30 million was spent on the last major renovation of the facility ahead of the World Junior Championships in 2002.

“All the seats were done, the track and the track base were re-done (plus) major modifications in the whole office area, so a lot of work was done, but I think we have out lived the life of this stadium,” major Brown argued.