CINCINNATI -- Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center expects to create up to 600 jobs with a massive new expansion of its main campus in Avondale.
The 625,000-square-foot expansion, expected to cost between $550 million and $650 million, will take five years to complete. Hospital officials are hoping to break ground by this fall.
“We need more space to care for the most critically ill babies, kids and teens who come to us for care from down the street, across the country and around the world,” the hospital said in a prepared statement. "(Between) 2009 and 2016, the average number of patients spending the night at our main campus hospital grew more than 26 percent.”
The expansion has been in the works since 2015 and was approved by the hospital’s board of directors as a 600,000-square-foot project in October. It's still subject to revision and regulatory approval by the city of Cincinnati.
It would require the rezoning of more than six acres of land and the re-routing of Erkenbrecher Avenue. The hospital hopes to add up to 150 new beds with the expansion, in addition to the 460 beds already located in two buildings adjacent to the planned new tower.
An expanded parking garage and new emergency department are also planned, along with new loading docks, pharmacy, kitchen space and respite space for both staff and families to rejuvenate.
The hospital hired Messer Construction as general contractor for the project, along with lead architects, GBBN in Cincinnati and ZGF Architects LLC in Portland. As it planned the project, the hospital tried to minimize the travel distance between essential services – which is why the new hospital tower will have a heliport and emergency room that directly links to “Building B” on the existing campus.
“It is critical that we have the right connections between areas like the emergency department, the operating rooms, and the units where we care for our sickest patients,” the hospital’s prepared statement reads. “After rigorous analysis of all possible solutions, it was clear the expansion had to be adjacent to and connected to our existing patient facilities.”
