Tuesday, February 5, 2019

Children's Hospital Construction Activity This Week


Children's Hospital has begun construction activity in preparation for the new Building Care, Forest B, Phase 2 of the expansion, planned to open in Spring of 2021.

The 310,000 square-foot addition will add an eight-story building and will includes diagnostic and treatment facilities, primarily out-patient cancer and others) labs, new state-of-the-art operating rooms, 20 inpatient beds, and a lobby. There will be two floors of underground parking and sterile processing. This will bring SCH bed total to 409, up from 200 before its expansion 2012 plan.

The helicopter landing pad has already moved temporarily to the roof of Forest A (176’), now known as Friends of Costco Building, Phase 1 of the expansion. The landing pad will be active for the next four years, until Building Care is completed Noise is expected to be louder than the former ground-based helipad. When Forest B is complete, the helistop will moves to its permanent location on top of the Friends of Costco Building (same height). 


The Hospital posted this information on their Construction Blog about specific construction activity this week:
    • Form concrete curbs
    • Demolish, saw cut and remove asphalt
    • Utilities: install water pipes; cut and cap existing stormwater pipes
    • Prepare dirt pads for drill rigs
    • Drill piles
    • Internal activities: plumbing and pipe installation; install firestop systems and seismic restraints; conduct pressure tests and inspections
    • On Wednesday, Bartlett Tree Experts will prune trees along Sand Point Way NE between Springbrook Professional Center and the former Wells Fargo building to make Seattle Children’s Emergency Department sign more visible to motorists.  The work will take place from 8am. to noon and the sidewalk will be closed during those hours. Chainsaws and chippers will be used, which will generate noise. 
The noisiest work will be drilling for the piles (scheduled all week) and the asphalt demolition and saw cutting, which is scheduled for Thursday. 
All work will take place within standard construction hours: 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday to Friday, and 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. on Saturday. 
Children's also posted about revised parking restrictions on 40th Avenue NE due to safety concerns:
Due to maneuvering conflicts between construction trucks and buses, parking will no longer be allowed on the east side of 40th Avenue NE between NE 45th Street and the Seattle Children’s ambulance driveway.  
Buses and trucks are not able to use 40th Avenue NE at the same time when parking is allowed on both sides of the street, which creates an unsafe situation. Three stalls-worth of parking space in that location were already marked as no parking; this change will convert the remaining two stalls to no parking. 
To mitigate for this additional parking restriction, two parking spaces on the west side of 40th Avenue NE near the old Wells Fargo building that had previously been marked as no parking are now being returned to public parking. This means there is no net loss of on-street parking.   
Safety is our top priority. This change will make travel safer on 40th Avenue NE for everyone.

Todd Johnson, Children's Hospital Vice President, Facilities and Supply Chain, told the Laurelhurst Blog Staff, last year:
Forest B will be approximately 300,000 square feet (about the size of Forest A) and eight stories tall, within approved Major Institution Master Plan guidelines. During construction, we may add a temporary construction driveway on Sand Point Way.  Construction will generally be five days a week and there will be activity after hours. 
Forest B will be a diagnostic and therapeutic building designed to support the sickest children in our region and will also be home to 20 new cancer care beds (only new beds in the project) on the top floor under an approved certificate of need to the State of Washington (a formal process to gain approval for additional beds).  
The new building will also have a new outpatient clinic space for cancer and cardiac care; a new infusion center; new large, state-of-the-art operating rooms and support spaces; a clinical laboratory and inpatient pharmacy and a work space for physicians and others caring for patients in the building.   
There will be approximately 300 underground parking spaces.  The Hospital shuttles will move to the north end of the site.  The circulation of shuttles, bicycles, pedestrians and cars will be better separated.   
We will make deliberate connections to the bus stops and Burke Gilman Trail crosswalk.  We are working with Transpo Group to better understand how to optimize the flow of traffic on and around our campus.
There will be a landscaped plaza and circulation area in front of the new building.  Existing landscaping around the construction site will be preserved and/or replaced and enhanced. 
We intend to utilize the existing entrances/exits on 40th Avenue NE and Sand Point Way and will continue to use the Penney Drive entrance as the primary means for entering and exiting.  The Phil Smart Way connector will remain in place.  
The hospital determined it needed additional facilities based on growing patient volumes, innovation-driven program growth (in areas such as immunotherapy and neurosciences), and the functional obsolescence of some of the oldest buildings on campus.  
We expect a certificate of occupancy in mid-2021.  We then will then commission building systems, clean, install furnishings and equipment, and complete staff training.  We should be ready to care for patients in late 2021 or early 2022.
Call 206-987-8000 or email construction@seattlechildrens.org with questions. 


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