As April turned to May, Yale-New Haven Hospital announced a blockbuster new project in the works: a 505,000-square-foot neuroscience center that will cost $838 million and take five years to complete. The largest development project in New Haven in a generation, the plan will transform and repurpose the hospital’s St. Raphael campus and vault the […]
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As April turned to May, Yale-New Haven Hospital announced a blockbuster new project in the works: a 505,000-square-foot neuroscience center that will cost $838 million and take five years to complete. The largest development project in New Haven in a generation, the plan will transform and repurpose the hospital’s St. Raphael campus and vault the hospital to national preeminence in neuroscience research and treatment.
No one argues that $840 million is a lot of dough, but since the April 29 announcement press conference, no word has come forward about how and where those dollars are to be spent.
Now we know more.
Michael D. Holmes, senior vice president for operations, came to YNHH shortly after its acquisition of the struggling Hospital of St. Raphael in 2012, and has been the point person on the integration of the two hospital campuses. “The goal for the acquisition was really to increase capacity, because our York Street campus was at 100-percent capacity,” he explains.
“Since then we have filled St. Raphael’s up, and the York Street campus continues to grow.”
The average daily patient “census” (population) is about 1,400 against a licensed capacity of 1,541. In a hospital industry with an average daily capacity of about 85 percent, Holmes explains, YNHH operates at about 92 percent hospital-wide, but between 95 and 100 percent in many areas, including heart and vascular care, surgical services, psychiatry/behavioral health — and neuroscience.
“What we decided to do was to expand neuroscience to the St. Raphael campus,” Holmes explains, in part because the York Street campus is “landlocked.”
The centerpiece of the new center will be a single structure with two towers housing 204 beds — a combination of ICU beds, medical/surgical beds and outpatient services focused around neuroscience care. That new structure, designed by the architecture firm Shepley Bulfinch, will also house 35 new ER rooms, Holmes explains. It will also have 200 new parking spaces beneath one of the towers.
The footprint of the new structure, which itself will cost about $700 million, will require the razing of three existing buildings now totaling about 60,000 square feet on the St. Raphael campus, including the private building on Sherman Avenue, two adjacent houses and the onetime convent that was home to the Sisters of Charity, who founded the Catholic hospital in 1907. It is also possible that some of the existing structures may be relocated or repurposed.
Renovation and demolition work will account for about $150 million of the $838 million price tag on the project.
That new structure on the block bordered by Sherman Avenue and George Street accounts for the bulk of the half-million square feet of new construction. In addition, two new parking garages will be built to accommodate another 1,600 parking spots.
The remainder of the $840 million is filled with relative non-construction-related odds and ends — such as a $3 million “bridge” payment to the City of New Haven and a prepayment of about $9 million in building fees.
