Hospitals in KW

[nms]

One benefit of the new mega hospital being planted on the west side of Waterloo is that it's just a teeny bit further away from Hamilton, our current "patient was transported out of the Region of treatment" hospital. Which would be faster for someone in the south end of Cambridge: a trip down Highway 8 to McMaster, or a trip up Highway 8/7/85 (whatever) to the new hospital site?

[KevinL]

A quick Google Maps check shows very equal numbers - a 32 minute drive.

[neonjoe]

Waterloo group wants new KW hospital built on UW lands
https://archive.is/jKzXo

[panamaniac]

A UW site makes sense if UofW is aiming for a Faculty of Medicine. Otherwise, I continue to hope for a Kitchener location.

[cherrypark]

A UW site makes sense if UofW is aiming for a Faculty of Medicine.  Otherwise, I continue to hope for a Kitchener location.

I don't think UW is angling for a faculty of medicine, but there is an enormous amount of bio-tech and med-tech opportunity at UW (including specialties like Optometry and Kin) and that with the stated priority of the new Innovation Arena makes me think a heavy integration of research and development into the hospital, but not as a teaching hospital (which presents its own enormous overhead and operations demands aside cultivating new tech).

That and easily the stated goal amount of space in north campus.

[SF22]

I am tentatively in favour of the Great Land Use Shuffle proposal, by putting the hospital on the Aud property by way of building a new Aud downtown - particularly if some existing adjacent city land is used to expand the space (ie: the parking lot across Gaukel behind the 44 Gaukel Creative Space, or the small parking lot near Grand Trunk with one of the buildings on Charles purchased to create a pedestrian link over Charles St, or build the Creative Space into the new Aud to absorb that space too). Having the Aud directly on the LRT instead of several blocks away would be fantastic, and ideally the downtown restaurants would get a boost from people getting dinner before a show or a game. The parking garages at Duke St, City Hall, and Frederick/Benton are all within 2-3 blocks of the site, and would see good evening usage and bring in some additional revenue for the city without needing to build a new parking structure for the Aud specifically. The new Aud could be built, or at least well-started, before the current one is ripped down to avoid being without that venue for a good few years between demolition and reopening.

If the LRT Phase 3 does turn out to be Ottawa St (Sunrise Centre to Breslau), then I imagine that having the hospital at the current Aud lands would create additional demand for that line and streamline the way for an approval. Pop a stop (with traffic lights) right at George Eugene and Ottawa for front-door access to the hospital. It would be very centrally located for all of KW, and has good bus access already that could easily be boosted to more frequent service.

I would prefer if some existing amenities on the site were kept - the dog park, the skatepark, and maybe add a basketball court or something into that corner as well, so that the neighbourhood doesn't lose out on those everyday amenities, but they could remain along Stirling to help keep things quieter on that side of the property.

For some wishful thinking, it would be cool to see a pedestrian bridge reconnect Stirling back to Wedgewood (or Burbank) over the highway, and to the Expressway Trail, for extra pedestrian accessibility but also an option to get to the hospital that doesn't require walking across the Ottawa St bridge.

I do live close to the Aud (1.5km away), and I'd be sad to see it go elsewhere, but I do think it could be a good move for the city. As a wild (read: impossible) alternative, I'd like to see the giant parking lot beside GRH get bought up and turned into hospital land, but I can't imagine that it'll get given up for a reasonable price when condo towers could get built there instead.

[bravado]

https://twitter.com/MsFritzzle/status/17...1814633938

Local activist Stephanie Fritz posted a tweet-thread about the public meeting tonight about the new hospital site. I have pasted it below for people who don't want to acknowledge the existence of Elon by clicking.

Tonight is the town hall meeting about the new KW hospital. Not entirely sure what to expect out of this, but I'll try to keep some notes and share what I learn here. I believe there's also an online stream you can watch from home.

Well, definitely a lot to absorb from that meeting! Great turnout, really respective crowd, which is great to see. There were five boards outside the auditorium with a prompt question on each, and sticky notes/markers so that everyone could contribute.

This is by no means exhaustive, just some points I thought were interesting. The full 2 hour discussion is here: https://youtube.com/watch?v=lo2HgDKNB0o There is closed-captioning on it, but it's automated and doesn't fully capture everything.

Facts for context:
-There are 400 beds at GRH, and 200 at St Marys. The new facility would have 1000.
-Both hospitals (Grand River and St Marys) would use all three sites (GRH King St campus, Freeport and new site)
-In the next 25 years, people aged 75+ will increase by 170%


There is a strong focus in solving current issues like overcrowding, long wait times, hallway medicine, etc by increasing bed capacity, and building a state-of-the-art hospital that will draw in and retain talent. More than 20 operating rooms are planned for the regional network.

St Marys and GRH have a 40 year history of sharing resources and working in partnership - did you know that they create a single patient card that is shared between both hospitals? Your medical history from one is immediately available at both.

St Marys will close their acute care facilities as part of this change, but there will be future discussions on how that site can be used to support the community.

The GRH King St site will remain open for certain services, and Freeport will be renewed and expanded as well.

Future of Care Together, the group spearheading this development, put out a survey late last year, and received 11,355 responses from the community.

They received 5 site proposals, and have moved forward with investigating 3 of them.

According to Carl Zehr, who is chairing the site selection committee, they expect to announce their preferred site at the end of March. They have not shared the 3 sites to prevent land speculation and an increase in land prices in the surrounding areas.

Re: the 50 acre requirement: this is a target handed down by the province, specifically the Ministry of Health. Most of our major urban hospitals are landlocked and can't redevelop in their existing space, but resources pop up around hospitals over time. (1h9m in video recording)

50+ acres is meant to allow a site to exist in perpetuity - there will always be space to redevelop, rip down outdated buildings, and grow, even in 100+ years. (GRH and St Marys are now 100 years old themselves). The site panel also questioned this requirement when proposed.

The site is intended to have its own helipad. The old helipad by Ontario Seed (King/Wellington) was shut down, and the hospitals currently use the Waterloo Region airport.

Goals for the new hospital facility include:
-avoiding duplication of services
-high sustainability (required to be LEED Silver or better)
-bringing neurosurgery back to the region
-net zero emissions
-universal design: accessible for everyone
-strong staff retention

In terms of timeline, they are aiming for 10 years to open - 5 years of planning and 5 years of construction - to open the new hospital in 2034/35. However, they are clear to say that getting bogged down in refining details endlessly could turn it into a 25 year project.

There was so much more discussed, but check the video to get the whole scoop: https://youtube.com/watch?v=lo2HgDKNB0o

You can also email the team at info@futureofcaretogether.ca with questions and comments - they promise to get back to you ASAP!

There are going to be more town halls and discussions in the future re: our new hospital, so you can also register your email on their website to stay in the loop with that: https://futureofcaretogether.ca

[westwardloo]

Looks like there is very little fight from the search committee to push back on the provinces 50 acres requirement. They could easily build on a 25 acres site with room for expansion/ redevelopment if the built up and had parking garages. Unfortunately this will be built at the edge of town surrounded by a sea of surface parking lots.   At this point I am just hopeful that they build it at the UW site. At least it would be somewhat central and close to transit. It would also serve as a great catalysis for the future of Biotech in the region.

[SF22]

Looks like there is very little fight from the search committee to push back on the provinces 50 acres requirement. They could easily build on a 25 acres site with room for expansion/ redevelopment if the built up and had parking garages. Unfortunately this will be built at the edge of town surrounded by a sea of surface parking lots.   At this point I am just hopeful that they build it at the UW site. At least it would be somewhat central and close to transit. It would also serve as a great catalysis for the future of Biotech in the region.

I have developed a theory that Bingemans is putting forward a chunk of property as a proposal. Their camping area is 50 acres, without even getting too close to Embassy Hall or FunWorx, if it stretches the full depth of Bingeman Centre Rd to the river. It would be 2km off the Wellington highway exit, relatively centralized in KW, and could be just 250m away from an LRT stop if they chose to put Phase 3 on Victoria with a stop at Bingeman Centre/Victoria/Lackner. I think there's also about 50 acres of space on the other side of the property, where the old paintball arena used to be, although the new highway 7 is cutting through there somewhere, so not sure how that affects space or desirability. Would it entirely surprise you if Bingemans chose to pop up a hotel on their site for weddings on the weekends and hospital visitors during the week?

[cherrypark]

Looks like there is very little fight from the search committee to push back on the provinces 50 acres requirement. They could easily build on a 25 acres site with room for expansion/ redevelopment if the built up and had parking garages. Unfortunately this will be built at the edge of town surrounded by a sea of surface parking lots.   At this point I am just hopeful that they build it at the UW site. At least it would be somewhat central and close to transit. It would also serve as a great catalysis for the future of Biotech in the region.

I have developed a theory that Bingemans is putting forward a chunk of property as a proposal. Their camping area is 50 acres, without even getting too close to Embassy Hall or FunWorx, if it stretches the full depth of Bingeman Centre Rd to the river. It would be 2km off the Wellington highway exit, relatively centralized in KW, and could be just 250m away from an LRT stop if they chose to put Phase 3 on Victoria with a stop at Bingeman Centre/Victoria/Lackner. I think there's also about 50 acres of space on the other side of the property, where the old paintball arena used to be, although the new highway 7 is cutting through there somewhere, so not sure how that affects space or desirability. Would it entirely surprise you if Bingemans chose to pop up a hotel on their site for weddings on the weekends and hospital visitors during the week?

Yeah, never rule out any seemingly arbitrary but helpful to someone details with the current regime. Though it also wouldn't surprise me if that number was plucked from some GTA sprawl expectation of "cost efficient" land need in future (read: not having to pay for denser builds or parking garages).

[the_conestoga_guy]

Given that they're now looking to have a helipad at the new hospital, I wonder if that rules out the Aud lands.

We've already seen some recent developments have to jump through hoops to comply with the airport's flight path restrictions. The Aud seems to line up with that path, so having helicopters flying in and out may be ruled impossible as it would directly conflict with other air traffic.

[ijmorlan]

Looks like there is very little fight from the search committee to push back on the provinces 50 acres requirement. They could easily build on a 25 acres site with room for expansion/ redevelopment if the built up and had parking garages. Unfortunately this will be built at the edge of town surrounded by a sea of surface parking lots.   At this point I am just hopeful that they build it at the UW site. At least it would be somewhat central and close to transit. It would also serve as a great catalysis for the future of Biotech in the region.

I have developed a theory that Bingemans is putting forward a chunk of property as a proposal. Their camping area is 50 acres, without even getting too close to Embassy Hall or FunWorx, if it stretches the full depth of Bingeman Centre Rd to the river. It would be 2km off the Wellington highway exit, relatively centralized in KW, and could be just 250m away from an LRT stop if they chose to put Phase 3 on Victoria with a stop at Bingeman Centre/Victoria/Lackner. I think there's also about 50 acres of space on the other side of the property, where the old paintball arena used to be, although the new highway 7 is cutting through there somewhere, so not sure how that affects space or desirability. Would it entirely surprise you if Bingemans chose to pop up a hotel on their site for weddings on the weekends and hospital visitors during the week?

Sounds reasonable to me. The 50 acre requirement is so obviously unneeded that it’s not at all unreasonable to start looking for corrupt reasons for its existence.

By the time you have 50 acres of hospital, you want maybe 10 hospitals, not one mega-complex. There is no growth scenario in which a single location of the hospital needs 50 acres of land. Maybe 50 acres of floor space, but that’s what multi-story structures are for.

[danbrotherston]

I have developed a theory that Bingemans is putting forward a chunk of property as a proposal. Their camping area is 50 acres, without even getting too close to Embassy Hall or FunWorx, if it stretches the full depth of Bingeman Centre Rd to the river. It would be 2km off the Wellington highway exit, relatively centralized in KW, and could be just 250m away from an LRT stop if they chose to put Phase 3 on Victoria with a stop at Bingeman Centre/Victoria/Lackner. I think there's also about 50 acres of space on the other side of the property, where the old paintball arena used to be, although the new highway 7 is cutting through there somewhere, so not sure how that affects space or desirability. Would it entirely surprise you if Bingemans chose to pop up a hotel on their site for weddings on the weekends and hospital visitors during the week?

Sounds reasonable to me. The 50 acre requirement is so obviously unneeded that it’s not at all unreasonable to start looking for corrupt reasons for its existence.

By the time you have 50 acres of hospital, you want maybe 10 hospitals, not one mega-complex. There is no growth scenario in which a single location of the hospital needs 50 acres of land. Maybe 50 acres of floor space, but that’s what multi-story structures are for.

To me, this doesn't sound like corruption...just typical North American sprawl insanity.

[panamaniac]

Isn't Bingemans land on the flood plain?

[SF22]

Isn't Bingemans land on the flood plain?

Part of it, at least. There's a slope halfway back on that property - Embassy and Marshall are technically down in the floodplain, but the trailer camping area is not, as it's up the hill.

https://maps.grandriver.ca/web-gis/publi...41,4814255