Industry News

Ellis Hospital plans to build a new $20-million, 36-bed intensive care unit at its Schenectady, N.Y., location. The two-floor unit will be located in the hospital’s A-wing to allow critically ill patients access to key services. Work is expected to begin in summer 2004 and reach completion in 18 months. The facility will replace the hospital’s 20-bed ICU that was built in 1973.

Kaiser Permanente is opening its new 102,000-sf Elk Grove, Calif. medical office building in early September 2003. The three-story, $34-million facility will accommodate 62 providers and 180 support staff engaged in obstetrics/gynecology, adult medicine, pediatrics, optometry, optical sales, radiology, psychiatry, laboratory, and pharmacy. The building will feature a health education center and Mohs skin cancer surgery services. The Elk Grove facility is part of Kaiser’s $1.6-billion 10-year development plan for the Greater Sacramento area.

Washington University School of Medicine recently completed the $5-million renovation of the fifth floor of the McDonnell Medical Sciences Building. The 30,000-sf project involved gutting the existing floor and constructing new offices, laboratories, cold rooms, microscope rooms, and tissue culture rooms for the departments of molecular oncology and cell biology. The renovation also included the creation of a BSL-3 laboratory. The project contractor was Tarlton Corp. of St. Louis.

Sanford-Brown College is developing a $3.6-million educational facility in the Eastport Plaza Business Park in Collinsville, Ill. Sited on six acres, the facility will enable the college to more than double its current 263-student enrollment at the campus. Housing classrooms, teacher and administrator offices, medical and computer labs, a bookstore, and a library, the facility will feature state-of-the-art wireless technology. Project contractor Impact Strategies is initiating construction in September 2003 with completion expected in April 2004. The facility was designed by Arcturis Inc.

St. Louis Community College recently completed the 59,000-sf South County Education and University Center. An extension of the Meramec campus, the facility will serve approximately 2,000 students. The technology-rich facility features three computer labs, 17 “smart” classrooms, two interactive TV rooms connecting to other colleges, and computer carts with radio cards for wireless Internet access. 19 telecommunications enclosures provide wireless Internet connection from nearly everywhere in the building. Ground was broken on the project in December 2001 by project contractor Fru-Con Corp.