Construction crews have completed the outside enclosure for Columbia St. Mary’s Prospect Medical Commons, allowing interior work to begin at the project on Milwaukee’s east side. The site is located northwest of the intersection of East North and North Prospect Avenues. The Prospect Medical Commons building will have a 54,000-square-foot Whole Foods grocery store on its first level, four floors of medical office above it occupying about 100,000 square feet of space and an attached parking garage for the medical offices. The project is expected to be completed by Nov. 1.
The Whole Foods store will be the first location in Wisconsin for the national chain, which specializes in organic foods. It will also include an underground parking structure for about 140 cars.
Whole Foods’ subcontractors recently took over their portion of the project, starting the installation of electrical, heating and cooling and other fixtures. Contractors for Columbia St. Mary’s have also started work on the second through fifth floors, where the physicians’ offices will be located.
"We’re far enough for interior work to commence," said Chris Smocke, president of Smocke & Associates, project administrator for the hospital’s expansion.
C.G. Schmidt Construction Inc. of Milwaukee is working under Smocke’s direction, as are other subcontractors.
"We’re now just at the onset of fit-out work like mechanical, electrical and plumbing," he said. "(Workers) are starting the partitions."
Whole Foods’ customers will be able to easily transport their groceries, still in their shopping carts, to the parking structure, via a Cartveyor, an escalator that can accommodate shopping carts. The Cartveyor is made by Milwaukee-based Pflow Industries Inc., which makes vertical lifts. A Pflow-made shopping cart lift will transport the carts back to the main floor.
Once complete, the building will house about 50 of Columbia St. Mary’s general care physicians. Another five to 10 independent physicians are expected to lease office space there as well, said Karol Marciano, executive vice president of development for Columbia St. Mary’s.
Patients will be able to park on
the same floor as their physicians,
Marciano said.
"The parking will be very convenient for patients, because they can park on the same floor as their physicians," she said. "The registration will be very convenient, largely because of the electronic health care records. It won’t feel like you’re going into a clinic. It will be very close and comfortable."
The structure will be open for parking at night for customers of east side restaurants, bars and clubs.
The building is the first phase of Columbia St. Mary’s Hospital’s plans to combine, renovate and expand their east side hospitals. The plans call for the current Columbia Hospital near the UW-Milwaukee campus to be closed, and the St. Mary’s campus to be greatly expanded.
The cornerstone of the expansion, a $417 million series of projects, is a new 670,000-square-foot hospital that will be built along East North Avenue between Lake Drive and Prospect Avenue. Plans also include two new medical office buildings, a new 25,000-square-foot cancer center, three new parking structures and renovation of the current Milwaukee campus hospital and historic St. Mary’s East Facility.
The entire project is expected to be complete by early 2010.
"When we look at the whole project, we’re looking at it to transform health care," Marciano said.
Some of the features being installed in the Prospect Medical Commons building are important parts of that transformation. While workers are installing wiring for electricity, they also will be installing both cables for high-speed data transfer and wireless technology.
"I think the real focal point is the technology that’s being built into (the building) now," Smocke said. "Physicians will be able to sit at their desk and electronically will be able to monitor their patients’ health records and access the PACS (picture archival and communications system) system. That’s really what sets this building apart."
PACS systems take images such as X-rays, CAT scans, MRIs and other medical images digitally. Because those images are digital, they can be shared via a secure computer network.
"There will be a fair amount of cable infrastructure, fiber optics and wireless technology as well," Smocke said. "This building, as well as the rest of the campus, has been designed to be as flexible as possible to accommodate state of the art technology that will be likely coming down the pipe in the next 10 years now."
All of the buildings in the expansion system are being designed with features to maximize patient comfort and safety, Marciano said.
In the next week or two, crews will break ground on the second medical office building and cancer center, as well as another parking structure. Crews will also break ground on the new hospital in late June.
April 14, 2006, Small Business Times, Milwaukee, WI
Progress on the East Side
Work Begins on the Inside of Prospect Medical Commons
By Eric Decker, of SBT
Construction crews have completed the outside enclosure for Columbia St. Mary’s Prospect Medical Commons, allowing interior work to begin at the project on Milwaukee’s east side. The site is located northwest of the intersection of East North and North Prospect Avenues. The Prospect Medical Commons building will have a 54,000-square-foot Whole Foods grocery store on its first level, four floors of medical office above it occupying about 100,000 square feet of space and an attached parking garage for the medical offices. The project is expected to be completed by Nov. 1.
The Whole Foods store will be the first location in Wisconsin for the national chain, which specializes in organic foods. It will also include an underground parking structure for about 140 cars.
Whole Foods’ subcontractors recently took over their portion of the project, starting the installation of electrical, heating and cooling and other fixtures. Contractors for Columbia St. Mary’s have also started work on the second through fifth floors, where the physicians’ offices will be located.
"We’re far enough for interior work to commence," said Chris Smocke, president of Smocke & Associates, project administrator for the hospital’s expansion.
C.G. Schmidt Construction Inc. of Milwaukee is working under Smocke’s direction, as are other subcontractors.
"We’re now just at the onset of fit-out work like mechanical, electrical and plumbing," he said. "(Workers) are starting the partitions."
Whole Foods’ customers will be able to easily transport their groceries, still in their shopping carts, to the parking structure, via a Cartveyor, an escalator that can accommodate shopping carts. The Cartveyor is made by Milwaukee-based Pflow Industries Inc., which makes vertical lifts. A Pflow-made shopping cart lift will transport the carts back to the main floor.
Once complete, the building will house about 50 of Columbia St. Mary’s general care physicians. Another five to 10 independent physicians are expected to lease office space there as well, said Karol Marciano, executive vice president of development for Columbia St. Mary’s.
Patients will be able to park on
the same floor as their physicians,
Marciano said.
"The parking will be very convenient for patients, because they can park on the same floor as their physicians," she said. "The registration will be very convenient, largely because of the electronic health care records. It won’t feel like you’re going into a clinic. It will be very close and comfortable."
The structure will be open for parking at night for customers of east side restaurants, bars and clubs.
The building is the first phase of Columbia St. Mary’s Hospital’s plans to combine, renovate and expand their east side hospitals. The plans call for the current Columbia Hospital near the UW-Milwaukee campus to be closed, and the St. Mary’s campus to be greatly expanded.
The cornerstone of the expansion, a $417 million series of projects, is a new 670,000-square-foot hospital that will be built along East North Avenue between Lake Drive and Prospect Avenue. Plans also include two new medical office buildings, a new 25,000-square-foot cancer center, three new parking structures and renovation of the current Milwaukee campus hospital and historic St. Mary’s East Facility.
The entire project is expected to be complete by early 2010.
"When we look at the whole project, we’re looking at it to transform health care," Marciano said.
Some of the features being installed in the Prospect Medical Commons building are important parts of that transformation. While workers are installing wiring for electricity, they also will be installing both cables for high-speed data transfer and wireless technology.
"I think the real focal point is the technology that’s being built into (the building) now," Smocke said. "Physicians will be able to sit at their desk and electronically will be able to monitor their patients’ health records and access the PACS (picture archival and communications system) system. That’s really what sets this building apart."
PACS systems take images such as X-rays, CAT scans, MRIs and other medical images digitally. Because those images are digital, they can be shared via a secure computer network.
"There will be a fair amount of cable infrastructure, fiber optics and wireless technology as well," Smocke said. "This building, as well as the rest of the campus, has been designed to be as flexible as possible to accommodate state of the art technology that will be likely coming down the pipe in the next 10 years now."
All of the buildings in the expansion system are being designed with features to maximize patient comfort and safety, Marciano said.
In the next week or two, crews will break ground on the second medical office building and cancer center, as well as another parking structure. Crews will also break ground on the new hospital in late June.
