AMSTERDAM ARENA

"architecture and eloquence are mixed arts whose end is sometimes beauty and sometimes use"

AMSTERDAM ARENA is opened by Queen Beatrix on August 14, 1996. Architect Rob Schuurman designed the ArenA. Ajax has 202 million guilders spent on the stadium. The arena is the house of AFC Ajax, the Amsterdam football club.
Turf, to take good care of the turf Amsterdam arena puts lamps after each game.The lamps promote the growth and recovery of the turf.

AMSTERDAM ARENA has the ff. features:

- the first stadium in Europe with a retractable roof.
- 18 minutes to close the roof, by means of 2 movable panels of 40x118 meters.
- each sliding roof weighs about 400 tons and each part is powered by eight engines
- land area of 35,000 sq. m., equivalent to 4 football fields
- the top is 78 m. high
- 1,650 posts which support the 150,000 tons Arena
- since Euro 2000 has 51,628 seats
- 10 founder lounges with 10 seats each lounge
- the Royal lounge has 40 seats, 1,564 business seats and 4,109 seats for other certificate holders
- 54 skyboxes, 8 sklylounges, and 12 skyrooms with a total of 820 seats
- the press gallery is the largest of all the Netherlands' stadia with a total of 230 seats
- 12,500 parking lots in the vicinity of the stadium
- 102 cameras and a TV circuit with 302 tvs
- a big screen of 50 sq. m. build up of 1,000,000 LEDS
- each screen weighs 13 tons and can be dismounted
- the heights of the gallery rings has a sharp angled, and therefore visitors can sit very close to the field.
- the design of the stadium was the principle that everyone should be able to see the sidelines without  obstructions (of the people infront of you)
- 15 escalators access to the second ring since Aug. 14, 2006

Great artists who performed in the arena:

The Rolling Stones performed 8 concerts in the arena.

Celine Dion in June 1999 with biggest number of visitors (61,083)

in the summer of 2006 the 500th event took place, TOPPERS IN CONCERT

Madonna in Sept. 2, 2008

and many more...

from 1997 until 2007 the Amsterdam Admirals have played more than 50 matches in the Arena

in the summer of 2006, millions of visitors have toured of the World of Ajax (one of the Netherlands' football club

in the summer of 2007 a total of 20 million people have visited the Amsterdam Arena for one event or the other.

I was there recently during the concert of TOPPERS, you should visit the place. THE ARENA IS FASCINATING! When you tour Europe don't miss to drop by at the AMSTERDAM ARENA.