VANCOUVER -- The B.C. government has given the green light to putting a $458-million retractable roof on BC Place Stadium after the 2010 Olympic Games.

B.C. Pavilion Corp. chair David Podmore said Friday a fixed-cost contract has been signed with PCL Constructors Canada Inc., and that the cost will be partly offset through the development of land adjacent to the Stadium.

The price tag includes construction of a temporary facility, probably at the Pacific National Exhibition in east Vancouver, for the B.C. Lions football team and the Vancouver Whitecaps soccer team until the new stadium is ready in the summer of 2011.

“This building will be ready and shiny and polished up by the Grey Cup in 2011,” Podmore said.

The new roof will be the largest cable-supported, fully retractable fabric roof in the world at more than four hectares, government officials said.

The fabric roof will be designed to retract into the centre of the roof opening, where it will be concealed inside a suspended, four-sided electronic video board.

The $485-million cost will be financed through a 40-year loan from the government to the BC Pavilion Corp., a.k.a. PavCo.

Podmore said the loan will be covered by shifting $42 million left from the Vancouver Convention Centre construction project to the BC Place Stadium upgrade and through the sale of development rights on the lands at the western edge of the stadium.

Podmore said there is room for 1.4 million square feet of development in the official development plan approved by the City of Vancouver for the BC Place lands.

The first section to be developed will have 600,000 square feet of retail, entertainment and office development with a large parking structure, he said.

The land will be leased, not sold, and details on various development projects will be announced in a few weeks, he added.

Podmore said corporate sponsors and advertisers for the refurbished stadium will also be sought. The naming of the stadium after a corporate sponsor could bring in $2 million to $3 million a year.

The B.C. Liberals promised a retractable roof as part of a $365-million revamp after the current Teflon roof on the stadium ripped and collapsed in 2007.

Earlier this month, Tourism and Culture Minister Kevin Krueger said the proposed retractable roof might be too expensive, with a cost at least “substantially higher” than the $365 million then budgeted for the renovation.

But on Friday, despite the considerable price jump, Krueger described the retractable roof as an economic stimulus project that is going to spur recovery in B.C. by creating “3,000 person years of employment.”

Asked about the wisdom of spending hundreds of millions on a new roof when Victoria is struggling to maintain spending on essential public services, Krueger said that “the way we pay for our health care, education and social services is by having a robust economy with people working and paying taxes.”

Krueger told reporters that the BC Place upgrade is a “wise use of our resources ... that is going to more than pay for itself in the not-too-distant future.”

NDP MLA Spencer Herbert said his party supports building the retractable roof, but questioned the $485-million cost when it was originally expected to cost $200 million.

“The price has doubled in a year’s time. This shows mismanagement by the B.C. Liberal government.”

Herbert also questioned Krueger’s claim that taxpayers won’t be on the hook, saying that the proposed transfer of development revenue for the roof upgrade is an economic cost to taxpayers who own the land.

Whitecaps president Bob Lenarduzzi appeared with Podmore and Krueger at the unveiling of the new roof project and told reporters, “To suggest that I am absolutely ecstatic with being part of today’s announcement is a huge understatement.”

The renovation of BC Place Stadium was key to the decision earlier this year by Major League Soccer to award a franchise to Vancouver Whitecaps FC, Lenarduzzi said.

“We now have an opportunity to take take it (soccer) to a new level,” he said, adding that city-wide interest in the Whitecaps could return to the heights it enjoyed in the late 1970s and ’80s when the team played in the North American Soccer League.

The roof will take about 20 minutesto open or close.

dward@vancouversun.com