New and Improved

Kaiser Permanente, McCarthy Combine on Panorama City Medical Campus Project

By Greg Aragon

Kaiser Permanente's new $267 million replacement hospital in Panorama City is being built on an operating medical campus.

Daniel R. Dumke, project director for Newport Beach-based general contractor McCarthy Building Cos., said one of the main concerns for both Kaiser and McCarthy was ensuring that hospital staff and visitors continue to have easy access to the existing facility during intermittent street closures, traffic re-routing and all other construction processes.

"Whenever you are interacting with the public, it is important to understand and not take for granted the confusion that may be created when you begin traffic and pedestrian re-routing," Dumke added. "It is often easy for the contractor to understand a site logistics plan, but not so much for the general public."

He said close communication with the client, easy-to-understand signage and additional staffing to assist medical staff and the public have been the key to overcoming the challenges of working 70 ft. from a fully-operational hospital.

"There has been a significant amount of coordination between the contractor and local hospital administration to make sure that both of their operations don't impact each other," said Dan Carney, project director for Kaiser.

Designed by Los Angeles-based CO Architects, the new 400,000-sq.-ft. hospital is being built on a six-acre portion of the 45-year-old hospital's 35-acre campus, on what was a surface parking lot near the original main entrance.

The project borke ground in January 2004. The new hospital is being constructed with structural steel and brace frames and sits atop more than 850 caisson piles, which are 30 inches in diameter and 50 ft. deep. When complete in June, the center will feature 218 beds in a six-story building, which will be accompanied by a new 20,000-sq.-ft. central utility plant.

Located in Panorama City, about 20 mi. northwest of downtown Los Angeles, the modern-styled, rectangular-shaped health center will feature exterior colors of light gray, earthy red and darkish purple. The latter color was implemented by the architect to tie into the nearby mountains of the San Fernando Valley, which turn purple at sunset.

The building was designed in 2000, using a "room template" plan, which means that all patient rooms are the same size and feature similar layouts. The plan makes it easy to change hospital functions in the future as different needs arise.

Carney said the existing hospital, which opened in 1962, is being replaced because it could not meet standards put forth by Senate Bill 1953, which requires that all general acute-care inpatient hospitals in California be retrofitted or rebuilt to meet earthquake life-safety standards by 2008. Even more stringent earthquake conformance mandates take effect by 2030.

The bill was passed in the wake of the 1994 Northridge earthquake, which affected 23 California hospitals, causing more than $3 billion in hospital- related damage.

"From an infrastructure standpoint, [the old hospital] was dated," Carney said. "A typical hospital building's lifespan is 50 years, including remodels and fixing, and this one is reaching the end of its useful life."

Carney said it would have been "cost prohibitive" to attempt to update the old medical center to meet code requirements.

Carney added that once the replacement hospital is complete, Kaiser will decide what to do with the old 11-building medical center.

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