Olympic Athletic Center of Athens
The Olympic Athletic Center of Athens "Spiros Louis" (to give it its full name) is named after the winner of the Marathon race in 1896, Spiros Louis, a resident of the Municipality of Amarousiou. The area of 1,000 stremma (1 stremma = 1,000 m2) where it is situated, is under the local government administration of the Municipality of Amarousiou.
The foundation stone of the Olympic Athletic Center of Athens was laid on the 8th of January 1980 by the then Prime Minister of Greece, who later became President of the Republic, Constantinos Karamanlis. The vision, which drove the construction of the Olympic Athletic Center, was to slowly create all the appropriate preconditions such that, at some stage, the Olympic Games could one day be hosted again in Greece.
Two years later, on the 8th of September 1982, the first day of the 13th European Championships PSC 82, the inauguration of the Olympic Athletic Center of Athens was conducted by the then President of the Republic, Constantinos Karamanlis, and the then Prime Minister Andreas Papandreou. The construction company was the German company Weidleplan, with the supervising architects, H. Stalhout, F. Herre and D. Andrikopoulos.
During subsequent years, around the Central Olympic Stadiums, other buildings were added: the Olympic Velodrome (opened in 1991), the Olympic Aquatic Center (1991), the Olympic Indoor Sports Center (1995), the Olympic Tennis Center, as well as all the other auxiliary athletic facilities.
The new Olympic Athletic Center of Athens was a masterpiece of construction and technological design, which today, with the addition of remodeling works by Santiago Calatrava, is an integral part of the developing area of the Northern suburbs of Athens.
