As expected, the City of Milan (Italy) proposed to the Organizing Committee of the Milan-Cortina 2026 Winter Games the integration of the Exhibition Center of Milan fair to host the speed skating events, a few weeks after the announced withdrawal of Baselga di Pinè from the system.
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Au during his recent visit to the construction site of the future Athletes’ Village, in the Porta Romana districtthe Mayor of Milan had announced that his teams would propose, for this beginning of the week at the latest, a site to host the speed skating competitions during the 2026 Olympics.
Also, and as it has been envisaged for several days nowthe option of the Parc des Expositions in Milan fair was officially presented this Monday, February 13 to the Organizing Committee of the Games, in order to compensate for the withdrawal of the site of Baselga di Pinè, in Trentino-Alto Adigea site whose redevelopment with a view to the Games was deemed too expensive last month, with a cost of between 70 and 75 million euros.
As reported today the daily “The Republic”the City of Milan proposes to use two of the twenty pavilions from the vast set designed by architect Massimiliano Fuksas and constituting one of the largest exhibition sites in the world.
View of one of the monumental facades of the Fiera Milano, Milan Exhibition Centre, Italy (Credits – Fiera Milano)Around a temporary ice rink with a 400 meter long track, the development of the pavilions would also include the installation of 7,000 to 8,000 places for the spectators, not to mention the arrangement of all the logistics and the various technical elements necessary for holding the aforementioned tests.
The proposal by the municipal authorities will now be submitted for approval to the International Olympic Committee (IOC) and the International Skating Union (ISU), which will then judge the feasibility and advisability – in particular budgetary – of install an Olympic ice rink within the Milan fair located in the north-west of the Lombard city and served by road and rail axes, as well as by the Milanese metro.
Said site is already involved in the organization of the next edition of the Winter Games, with pavilions to house the International Center for Radio and Television (CIRTV) and the Main Press Center (CPP).
Visual of the Speed Ring project initially envisaged in Baselga di Piné, Italy (Credits – Studio Zoppini Architetti)If by chance the Parc des Expositions de Milan fair was to join the mapping of sports venues for the Milan-Cortina 2026 Games, the hypothesis of an integration of Turin among the clusters of this winter edition would be ruled out, at least in part and subject to the good progress of the planned operations on the sites currently selected by the Organizing Committee.
It must be said that the past weeks have made it possible to highlight the distance desired by local and regional authorities, in Milan and Lombardy, vis-à-vis the city of Piedmont, host of the 2006 Olympics but whose attitude in the pre-candidacy phase could have been perceived as an affront.
Turin had indeed refused to join the system proposed by the Italian National Olympic Committee (CONI) around three major poles, namely Milan, Cortina d’Ampezzo, and therefore Turin.
