Our (smaller) hospital

Friday 24 September 2021

Designers have reduced the size of plans for the new hospital by around 4,000 square metres, following feedback from the public to the old designs.

According to the project team, the changes will contribute to ensuring the project comes in on-time and on-budget.

The building is now planned to be around 69,000sqm, no longer featuring the curved design of the previous building and with a reduced height.

Whilst the boulevard remains, the building's upper body has been moved back away from Val André valley.

This change has been aided through creating a new ‘interstitial plant floor’ for the hospital’s functions between the middle floors of the building, above which are people’s spaces, such as two green terraces looking out to St. Aubin, and a paediatric courtyard.

Pictured: The previous 'tortoise-shell' roof design has been replaced in the new concept.

The building has also been pushed in on its south and north sides.

The staff changing area has also been moved from the basement to first floor, something the project's Clinical Lead, Professor Ashok Handa, said would help keep the project on-budget or go under budget.

Professor Handa explained that the estimated cost of digging into granite is around £10,500 per square metre, whereas otherwise clinical space was estimated at £5,500 per square metre and non-clinical space £3,500 per square metre.

The mental health centre has now been changed to a single storey building and moved five metres to the west to create more privacy for residents both in the centre and nearby, while accounting for the nearby Mont à l'Abbé cemetery's Grade 2 Listed status.

Pictured: The building has been moved away from Val Andre valley following feedback.

The mental health facility will have two 15-bed inpatient wards, positioned around secure courtyards.

However, the land needed for the mental health facility - Field 1550 - is still yet to be acquired, and a developer recently began advertising yet-to-be-built homes there.

Addressing this, Deputy Chief Minister and political lead for the hospital project Senator Lyndon Farnham said negotiations were still ongoing, and said a compulsory purchase was being considered.

Pictured: The sign that recently went up on Field 1550, which is needed for the mental health facility.

"We're still in negotiations and in discussion with the owners of some of that piece of land," he explained.

"We've successfully negotiated the majority of land acquisition but there are some outstanding areas, mainly that area and the parish land. So they're still under discussion, but that could possibly be one of the pieces that we move to compulsory purchase - we remain optimistic that we don't, but it's still a discussion point."

The floor and roof has also been taken off the multi-storey carpark, leaving three-and-a-half decks.

While many design areas have been minimised, the project team said they were now planning more landscaping around the area, with more trees and greenery.

CLICK TO ENLARGE: A look at how Victoria Park would be altered.

Dr Ashok Handa said that the final size of the building would depend upon "the next level of feedback" user groups give on the new plans, but that the current plan is for the hospital to be 69,000sqm in total, which he noted was around a 4,000sqm decrease from the previous proposals.

Travel routes have also been altered, with the roundabout on St. Aubin's Road Roundabout by Victoria Park now enlarged to cope with the two-way traffic, and the 'active travel corridor' between People's Park and the hospital.

Though Victoria Park will be made smaller as a result of this, the carpark alongside the apartments neighbouring People's Park is to be given more greenery.

Pictured: The view of the new design from Noirmont Point.

At the top of Westmount Road, 'Our Hospital' Lead Architect Steve Featherstone noted that the current preferred option of residents was keeping something like the existing tall granite wall, but having it pushed back to match the new widened road.

Asked for an update on plans for the crematorium,Senator Farnham reaffirmed that the idea of other venues being used for services whilst building work was ongoing was "likely", but still being discussed.

He added that the long-term future of the crematorium was "still under discussion", and would be dealt with as a separate project.

Professor Handa added that if crematorium services were to stay on site during construction, "there are absolutely certain plans to make sure that during the build phase, there would be sufficient training and protection from noise and dust etcetera."

Pictured: More greenery and landscaping has been included in this latest batch of designs.

He added that "in the long term... the development of the screening would be such to have that privacy and protection of such a facility, were it to continue being in the current location." 

The latest designs are now out for consultation, with the design team promising that final tweaks will be made before they put forward a full planning application in November.

Senator Farnham said that the team are hoping the planning enquiry will have concluded and a final decision made around April or May 2022, with the hospital opening its doors by 2026.

GALLERY: The latest hospital designs...