In a bid to conserve space, an elementary school in China has built a 200-metre-long running track on the roof of its oval-shaped building.
The elementary school of Tiantai Chicheng district in eastern coastal Zhejiang province, which has about 1,800 students, started using the track since yesterday.
Qiu Tianguo, the school's principal, said the track, on top of a four-storey, oval teaching building, provides more than 3,000 square metres of space for students to play and exercise.
Qiu said that the school, with a footprint of 7,210 square metres, doesn't have room for a playground with a running track on the ground.
"The track on the roof perfectly solved the problem. Our students love the new track," he told a state-run China Daily.
Breaking the tradition of a running track on the ground might provide a solution for other schools with limited land, said Ruan Hao, chief architect of the teaching building.
"Under the circumstances that limited land cannot provide enough space for students to exercise in, we chose to challenge the concept that playgrounds and tracks have to be on the ground," he said.
The design was represented by China at the 14th Venice Architecture Exhibition this year.
In order to ensure safety of the children, three protective layers have been built on the roof.
The outer layer is 1.8-metre-tall tempered glass wall, a safety glass that students can't climb, has been build. The middle layer has a green belt and the inner layer is a 1.2-metre-tall stainless steel rail.
Students using the track are accompanied by teachers and surveillance cameras around the track will make sure that there is no blind spot, Qin said.
