(BEIJING, March 23) -- On the morning of March 23, construction started on Tennis Center, a venue of the 2008 Olympic Games.

   Located at Olympic Green, a forest park to host a number of Olympic events, the Tennis Center is adjacent to Olympic Archery Field now under construction. The center will host Olympic tennis preliminaries and finals of singles and doubles for men and women and Paralympic wheelchair tennis competitions.

   The center covers an area of 16.68 hectares with a floor space of 26,514 square meters. According to the requirements of the Olympic Games, the center will have 10 competition courts and 6 training courts, with a capacity of 17,400 seats.

   The project embodies the concepts of Green Olympics, Hi-Tech Olympics and People's Olympics. It integrates design experiences of world sport architecture and will be a tennis competition venue of the state of the art design in keeping with international standards.