The London Arena (also known as London Docklands Arena) was an

indoor arena An arena is a large enclosed platform, often circular or oval-shaped, designed to showcase theatre, musical performances, or sporting events. It is composed of a large open space surrounded on most or all sides by tiered seating for spectator ...

and

exhibition centre A convention center (American English; or conference centre in British English) is a large building that is designed to hold a convention, where individuals and groups gather to promote and share common interests. Convention centers typica ...

Millwall Millwall is a district on the western and southern side of the Isle of Dogs, in east London, England, in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets. It lies to the immediate south of Canary Wharf and Limehouse, north of Greenwich and Deptford, eas ...

, close to

Cubitt Town Cubitt Town is a district on the eastern side of the Isle of Dogs in London, England. This part of the former Metropolitan Borough of Poplar was redeveloped as part of the Port of London in the 1840s and 1850s by William Cubitt, Lord Mayor of L ...

area of Poplar, on the

Isle of Dogs The Isle of Dogs is a large peninsula bounded on three sides by a large meander in the River Thames in East London, England, which includes the Cubitt Town, Millwall and Canary Wharf districts. The area was historically part of the Manor, Ha ...

, in

east London East or Orient is one of the four cardinal directions or points of the compass. It is the opposite direction from west and is the direction from which the Sun rises on the Earth. Etymology As in other languages, the word is formed from the ...

, England which was inaugurated in 1989 and demolished for housing in 2006. Seating capacity was up to 15,000, depending on the type of event held. It was the home of the London Knights

ice hockey Ice hockey (or simply hockey) is a team sport played on ice skates, usually on an ice skating rink with lines and markings specific to the sport. It belongs to a family of sports called hockey. In ice hockey, two opposing teams use ice ...

team, the

London Towers London Towers were a professional basketball team based in London, England. They enjoyed considerable success in the 1990s and early 2000s, collecting 3 titles in the British Basketball League (BBL) as well as regularly competing in European c ...

basketball team and later the

Greater London Leopards Greater may refer to: * Greatness, the state of being great *Greater than, in inequality Inequality may refer to: Economics * Attention inequality, unequal distribution of attention across users, groups of people, issues in etc. in attention e ...

basketball team.

History

First opened in 1989, the arena was built on the grounds of a former harbour warehouse at Millwall Inner Dock as part of the redevelopment of the Docklands area, which was developed from a harbour and industrial area to a trade and residential one. The arena could seat up to 12,500 people in the stands and up to 15,000 in concert mode. Events ranged from sport events like basketball, ice hockey, wrestling and boxing to music concerts and trade exhibitions.

Spectacor Management Group SMG was an American worldwide venue management group headquartered in West Conshohocken, Pennsylvania, that specialized in managing publicly owned facilities. It began their operation in 1977 with management of the Louisiana Superdome. It was on ...

(SMG), the world's largest private facility management company, took over ownership of the London Arena in 1994. The company manages arenas and stadiums in the US and Europe, including the

Louisiana Superdome The Caesars Superdome, commonly known as the Superdome (formerly known as Mercedes-Benz Superdome), is a multi-purpose stadium located in the Central Business District of New Orleans, Louisiana. It is the home stadium of the New Orleans Sain ...

, the

Mile High Stadium Mile High Stadium (originally Bears Stadium until 1968) was an outdoor multi-purpose stadium located in Denver, Colorado from 1948 to 2001. The stadium was built in 1948 to accommodate the Denver Bears baseball team, which was a member of the ...

Denver Denver () is a consolidated city and county, the capital, and most populous city of the U.S. state of Colorado. Its population was 715,522 at the 2020 census, a 19.22% increase since 2010. It is the 19th-most populous city in the Unit ...

and the

Ullevaal Stadium Ullevaal Stadion () is an all-seater stadium, all-seater association football, football stadium located in Oslo, Norway. It is the home ground of the Norway national football team, and the site of the Norwegian Football Cup, Norwegian Cup Fin ...

Oslo Oslo ( , , or ; sma, Oslove) is the capital and most populous city of Norway. It constitutes both a county and a municipality. The municipality of Oslo had a population of in 2022, while the city's greater urban area had a population of ...

. During 1998, SMG entered into a partnership agreement with another American based company, Anschutz Sports Holdings, to hold an equal share in the ownership of London Arena.

Renovation

The arena received a £10 million refit in 1998, allowing the capacity of the arena to be altered hydraulically. One of the primary reasons for the refit by joint owners, Anschutz Entertainment Group, was to introduce professional ice hockey back to London with the London Knights. Along with this, the brief given to architects, HOK Sport, was to turn the arena into a major multi-entertainment centre. This involved introducing a permanent Olympic-size ice rink, 48 luxury hospitality boxes with views over the arena, two brand new team dressing rooms, a completely refurbished foyer and box office, plus a state-of-the-art SACO SmartVision video scoreboard, the only one of its kind outside the US. However, the arena continued to struggle to attract enough visitors and events to be profitable and it never managed to become a financial success. One reason for this was its rather isolated geographical position, combined with poor local road and public transport access and limited parking space, although it was well served by the

Crossharbour and London Arena DLR station Crossharbour is a light metro station on the Docklands Light Railway (DLR) Bank-Lewisham Line in Cubitt Town, East London. The station is situated on the Isle of Dogs and is between Mudchute and South Quay stations and is in Travelcard Zone 2. ...

. However, on days when events were held at the arena, it was not uncommon for the small station to be severely overcrowded.

Sale, closure and demolition

In 2003, the arena was sold, which, combined with the disbanding of the

Ice Hockey Superleague The British Ice Hockey Superleague (BISL, also known as the Sekonda Ice Hockey Superleague from 1998 to 1999 for sponsorship reasons) was a professional ice hockey league in the United Kingdom between 1996 and 2003. Devised in 1995, it replaced ...

, led to the folding of the London Knights, the only tenant at the arena at the time, leaving the arena without a permanent tenant, which made the situation worse. In 2005, the arena was closed and was superseded as the main arena by

The O2 Arena The O2 Arena, commonly known as the O2 (stylised as The O2 arena), is a multi-purpose indoor arena in the centre of the O2 entertainment complex on the Greenwich Peninsula in southeast London. It opened in its present form in 2007. It has the ...

, which is in

The O2 The O2 is a large entertainment district on the Greenwich peninsula in South East London, England, including an indoor arena, a music club, a Cineworld cinema, an exhibition space, piazzas, bars, and restaurants. It was built largely withi ...

entertainment complex (formerly the

Millennium Dome The Millennium Dome was the original name of the large dome-shaped building on the Greenwich Peninsula in South East London, England, which housed a major exhibition celebrating the beginning of the third millennium. As of 2022, it is the ni ...

). The arena was demolished in June 2006 and has since been replaced by a mostly-residential development, including the

Baltimore Tower Baltimore Tower, also known as Arena Tower and nicknamed The Slinky due to its resemblance to the Slinky, popular toy, is a high-rise residential skyscraper in Millwall on the Isle of Dogs, London, England. The building is located on a site that ...

. In 2007, the Crossharbour and London Arena DLR station was renamed to simply Crossharbour. However, the London Arena name still remains on a few street signs in the area.

Notable events

Events

On 18 November 1989, the Arenaball Transatlantic Challenge, the first ever

Arena Football League The Arena Football League (AFL) was a professional arena football league in the United States. It was founded in 1986, but played its first official games in the 1987 season, making it the third longest-running professional football league in ...

exhibition game An exhibition game (also known as a friendly, a scrimmage, a demonstration, a preseason game, a warmup match, or a preparation match, depending at least in part on the sport) is a sporting event whose prize money and impact on the player's or ...

in Europe, was played there, with the

Detroit Drive The Massachusetts Marauders were a professional arena football team that was based in Worcester, Massachusetts. They were a member of the Arena Football League (AFL) from 1988 to 1994. The team was established in Detroit in 1988, as the Detroit ...

winning over the Chicago Bruisers 43–14. In 1989, the WWE held its first ever United Kingdom event at the London Arena, as well as the UK Rampage 1991 event and Capital Carnage in December 1998. Frank Sinatra played the arena in summer 1990, with the Woody Herman Orchestra conducted by Frank Sinatra Junior. Promoted by Frank Warren. The

1998 1998 was designated as the ''International Year of the Ocean''. Events January * January 6 – The ''Lunar Prospector'' spacecraft is launched into orbit around the Moon, and later finds evidence for frozen water, in soil in permanently s ...

and

1999 File:1999 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The funeral procession of King Hussein of Jordan in Amman; the 1999 İzmit earthquake kills over 17,000 people in Turkey; the Columbine High School massacre, one of the first major school shoot ...

editions of the

Brit Awards The BRIT Awards (often simply called the BRITs) are the British Phonographic Industry's annual popular music awards. The name was originally a shortened form of "British", "Britain", or "Britannia" (in the early days the awards were sponsored ...

were held at the arena, and from 1989 until 2001, it was also the annual venue of the

Smash Hits Poll Winners Party The Smash Hits Poll Winners Party was a British awards ceremony which ran from 1979 (as the Smash Hits Readers' Poll) to 2005. Each award winner was voted by readers of the '' Smash Hits'' magazine. It ended with the closure of the magazine in F ...

. In the year 2000

World Championship Wrestling World Championship Wrestling, Inc. (WCW) was an American professional wrestling promotion founded by Ted Turner in 1988, after Turner Broadcasting System, through a subsidiary named Universal Wrestling Corporation, purchased the assets of Nati ...

would tour the UK twice, unbeknownst it would be the last time they came to the UK before being purchased by rival promotion

World Wrestling Entertainment World Wrestling Entertainment, Inc., d/b/a as WWE, is an American professional wrestling promotion. A global integrated media and entertainment company, WWE has also branched out into other fields, including film, American football, and var ...

in March 2001. The first Tour in March was a run of three house shows including a sell out show at the Docklands Arena and then in November for televised episodes of

WCW Nitro ''WCW Monday Nitro'', also known as ''WCW Nitro'' or simply ''Nitro'', is an American professional wrestling television program that was produced by World Championship Wrestling (WCW) and broadcast weekly every Monday night on TNT in the Unite ...

and WCW Thunder both of which sold out the Docklands Arena. In December 2005, it housed the annual 'Crisis Open Christmas' event (held the previous year in the

) providing food, accommodation and various medical and social services to homeless people in London, organised by the London-based homelessness charity

Crisis A crisis ( : crises; : critical) is either any event or period that will (or might) lead to an unstable and dangerous situation affecting an individual, group, or all of society. Crises are negative changes in the human or environmental affair ...

Concerts

References

External links

Description at sportsvenue-technology.com
*
Pictures of the demolition of the London Arena.
{{Authority control Basketball venues in England Sports venues demolished in 2006 Defunct indoor arenas in the United Kingdom Defunct sports venues in London Former buildings and structures in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets Indoor arenas in London Music venues completed in 1989 Music venues in London Sports venues completed in 1989 Sports venues in London Defunct basketball venues Former ice hockey venues Millwall Demolished sports venues in the United Kingdom