New hospital building reaches halfway mark

Work on the $445 million new building at Christchurch Hospital has reached halfway and the project is on track for completion next year.

When it is fully operational, the nine-storey Acute Services Building will provide additional operating theatres, about 400 inpatient beds, purpose-designed spaces for children, a rooftop helipad, an extended radiology department, and expanded intensive care unit and emergency department. 

About 400 construction workers are on site at the new Acute Services Building at Christchurch Hospital.

CPB is constructing the facility which is the single largest project in the Canterbury rebuild and will become the largest hospital building in the South Island.

During a site tour on Friday, Leonie Kelly, Project Director for Turner and Townsend Thinc on behalf of the Health Ministry, said after 12 months work the project as a whole had reached the halfway mark and construction was about 40 per cent complete with 6000 tonnes of steel framing in place for the 62,000 sqm building.

The building is due to be completed in late 2018.

“Come early 2018 we’ll be able to go out to the community with more definitive timing about when practical completion will be.”

Patients recovering in the new wards would enjoy fantastic views over Hagley Park, towards the Port Hills and over the city, with floor to ceiling windows on each side of the building.

“It’s a very nice way to not feel like you’re in a hospital environment. The ensuited bedrooms are on the perimeter to give full access to this view.”

Some of the rooms will have multiple beds to accommodate family members.

A new helipad on the rooftop will provide space for two helicopters and will allow patients to be transferred by lift directly to an operating theatre. Currently choppers land outside in the hospital grounds.

The Acute Services Building has more than 2000 rooms and has been designed for safety in an earthquake with base isolators installed on the lower ground floor. The isolators would absorb up to two-thirds of the impact from a major quake, such as the February 2011 event.

A 10,000 sqm glass “curtain wall” is in place on the West Tower of the building, and CPB Project Director David Grehan said the next milestone would be getting a roof on the building and making it watertight.

More than 400 workers are currently on site but numbers are expected to grow to up to 600 in a few months when work reaches a peak.

In a separate hospital project, construction is also underway on the Christchurch Outpatients facility which is also scheduled for completion next year. It will be five storeys high and provides 10,500 sqm of facilities for outpatient and other clinical services including endocrinology, ophthalmology and dental.

Time lapse photography on the Canterbury District Health Board’s Facilities Development Project webpage shows construction of the new buildings.