Trelawny Multi-Purpose Stadium to be Renamed in Bolt’s Honour

Author

Jamaica Information Service (JIS)

Release Date

Tuesday, September 15, 2015

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The Trelawny Multi-Purpose Stadium is to be renamed in honour of Jamaica’s greatest and most iconic athlete, Dr. the Hon. Usain Bolt.

The facility will be known as the Usain Bolt Sports Academy.

Providing details at Wednesday’s (September 9) Jamaica House press briefing, Minister with responsibility for Sport, Hon. Natalie Neita Headley, said the move is being driven by Prime Minister, the Most Hon. Portia Simpson Miller, in order to ensure that Bolt is adequately honoured in his homeland.

"It has been the Prime Minister’s dream and not just since Beijing 2015, but Cabinet’s records will reflect her desire to have that stadium in his home parish named appropriately the Usain Bolt Sports Academy," she said.

While not giving a timeline for the renaming, the Minister said: "We would not do so however, until the completed plans of putting in the proper infrastructure is realised to include a running track."

She informed that several infrastructural upgrades will be undertaken beginning with the installation of a $26 million irrigation system at the facility.

Minister Neita Headley said the Usain Bolt Sports Academy is expected to attract athletes from across the globe and contribute to the country’s tourism product.

"I think many people across the world, including sportsmen and sportswomen, would want to be a part, and associated with that stadium, more so if it is named the Usain Bolt Sports Academy. We would want to see people coming there to train and to be a part of a package and a tourism product which, I think, would be second to none," she said.

Bolt is a six-time Olympic gold medallist and has won 11 International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) World Championship gold medals.

The Trelawny Multi-Purpose Stadium in Falmouth was completed in 2007. It has capacity for 25,000 people. It was built under an agreement between Jamaica and the People’s Republic of China, which provided some $30 million for the project.

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