VANCOUVER -- Bob Johnston's architectural hand has been felt in the construction of half the world's Olympic speed-skating ovals, and his knowledge of functional recreational building design has kept a small army of architects working around the world.

But when he looks at his newest creation - the iconic heron-wing 2010 Olympic speed-skating oval in Richmond, B.C., along the banks of the Fraser River - he sees something entirely different than what he and the rest of the architectural world have become accustomed to.

When the oval opens to the public on Friday, Johnston says people will be treated to a building that breaks new ground in how large-space sporting facilities are created and used after an Olympic event. What pleases him more than anything else is that unlike most similar facilities in the world, this oval will have a post-Games legacy that will see it in constant public demand.

"That's always been the challenge with ovals: What do you do with them afterwards and how much more use can you get out of them?" said Johnston, the 55-year-old principal in Cannon Design Inc., which won the contract to design the $178-million Oval. "This building has a different life after the Olympics."

The concept of putting 400-metre speed-skating tracks indoors is relatively new. Until the 1988 Winter Games in Calgary, Olympic competitions were held outdoors. Calgary's organizers convinced the International Skating Union to put its track inside a concrete-roofed room. In doing so, they created a facility that moderated ice conditions and, in the process, altered the sport forever. Calgary's high-altitude ice is among the fastest in the world; eight of 10 world speed records were set there until Johnston built the Salt Lake City oval.

Including Calgary's, there have been only six ovals built specifically for the Olympics, and another half dozen for World Cup or other lesser events. Such big buildings, built for a single purpose, can qualify for white-elephant status. Of the Olympic ovals, half struggle for relevance. The $300-million "M-wave" oval built for the 1996 Nagano Games, and Oval Lingotto built for the 2006 Turin Games, are now used more as convention facilities, Johnston said. The oval for the 1992 Lillehammer Games, which resembles an upturned Viking ship, also has trouble because it is not near a populated centre.

Even the Calgary and Salt Lake ovals have a limited use, primarily as homes for elite-level athlete training and as part of an international competition circuit. So against that background, it was difficult for Richmond, the Vancouver Olympic organizing committee and Johnston to justify creating a building that could only ever be used as a speed-skating oval.

Instead, Johnston designed the 343,000-square-foot building to be converted after the Games to a massive community facility that will accommodate two international-sized ice-hockey sheets at one end, several hardwood ball courts in the middle and a 200-metre running track at the other end. The rest of the building will house a fitness facility, wellness centre, high-performance sport facility and offices for national sports teams.

The building also has been built to modern sustainability standards, including silver LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) certification. The expansive refrigeration system for the Olympic-period, 400-metre track will remain, meaning the oval could host World Cup events if the cost of temporarily re-converting it to an oval is justified, said Ted Townsend, the City of Richmond's manager of communications.

"This will probably be Canada's largest community centre," Townsend said. "We took into consideration Richmond's future needs when we commissioned the building and we see it as a multi-purpose facility that will help anchor the city to its heritage on the Fraser River."

The Oval has one other secret. In a technical first, it incorporates an opportunity to vary icing conditions on different parts of the track. That's because unlike the high-altitude tracks in Calgary and Salt Lake, Richmond's sea-level track will be slower because of barometric pressure and humidity.

"What we did with the Richmond Oval was to design the refrigeration system so that the operator can create different ice conditions at the ends than on the straightaways," Johnson said. "You can moderate it so that the ice on the ends is microscopically softer so that you hold your edge on the skate as you go around the end, and harder on the straights so that you can go faster."

It won't make the track a world record-breaker, but will still give athletes a fast race, he said.

Johnston, who moved to Victoria to oversee construction of the 1994 Commonwealth Games venues and never left, now has more work than he can handle. In addition to the Richmond Oval, he's working on the 2014 Sochi Winter and 2012 London Summer Games. His company is also involved in a number of local design projects, including part of the rehabilitation of Vancouver's BC Place.

Hey Bob - thanks for helping make this happen.  No problem picking up the tickets, everything was fine - and we saw Bolt beat the 200m WR.  Great!

Thanks so much for assisting me again with our Olympic tickets. You have been top rate.