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Business First of Columbus wrote
Children’s adding on to expansion plan
by Carrie Ghose
Monday, November 26, 2007
The new main wing of Nationwide Children’s Hospital will have an extra floor and cost $60 million more than original plans, the hospital announced Monday.
When completed, the expansion will make the south Columbus campus the second-largest pediatric hospital and research center in the United States, the hospital said. Construction is expected to begin next year.
The 12-story, $800 million expansion has 200,000 square feet more than the 2005 design because patient projections are rising faster than expected. Officials had said at community meetings in August that the design would likely be enlarged because Children’s expects to treat 1 million patients a year by 2012, when the expansion is expected to open. That’s up from about 400,000 patients in 1998 and 700,000 in 2005.
The hospital says the expansion will create 2,400 jobs and will have an overall economic impact of $1 billion.
A plan to reconfigure the exit from Interstates 70/71 that routes traffic to Parsons Avenue instead of 18th Street also led to changes in the design from two years ago. The addition will be rotated to face Parsons, tucking it closer to the existing buildings and freeing space on the perimeter of the campus for a 6-acre park-like setting.
Related Stories:
- Children’s Hospital presents 2012 ideas
I didn’t realize they were adding that many jobs! :shock:
That’s some serious impact. Those aren’t just 2,400 minimum wage jobs, or even 2,400 decent blue collar jobs…those are 2,400 high paying jobs w/ solid benefits.
We can talk about gentrification, downtown development, and a vibrant arts scene all we want, but none of that happens without jobs like these. Gotta keep packing ‘em in.
Fantastic! 12 stories and over means Columbus can have one more “tall building” added to our measly Emporis.com list!
On a related note, I tried to become an editor w/emporis to update our buildings compilation and was rejected. If any of the current editors are reading this, please take the time to update our city entry!
Here’s a link to the movie & a pic – pretty impressive
A couple of easily overlooked things in the press release that people should be cognizant of:
1. The expansion is based on patient population projections. Patient projections don’t always grow as quickly as planned even when your organizations hospitals are in one of the highest growth regions of the country.
2. The projections are based on growth in a influx of out of area patients. I’m not sure what models they use to forecast that kind of growth, but when you’re basing your growth on people who don’t live in the area, unless you’re a huge tourist mecca, it can be a bit shaky.
3. Children’s hospitals right now are big business. There are organizations right now that go around the country trying to build hospitals in areas where they don’t already have a business relationship because there’s money in children’s healthcare, both through Medicaid and private insurance. No one wants to be accused of not funding children’s healthcare so the revenue stream from treating sick children is probably “safer” than most.
It’s fascinating to watch healthcare organizations jockey for patients and dollars. Eventually one of them is going to overbuild and get in real financial trouble, but who knows, they’ll probably just get bought up by another one.