Facility on track despite delay

Farzeen Foda

Senior News Editor

The McMaster Downtown Health Campus project began in 2007, and experienced a standstill soon thereafter. The goals of the University and the City of Hamilton, however, remained unchanged.

The City of Hamilton is looking to revitalize the downtown core, which may be accomplished through the establishment of an innovative medical facility, which will increase access to quality healthcare in the area while attracting cutting-edge talent to the city. McMaster has also expressed an interest in expanding its presence in the city, and is under considerable pressure to increase its residency spaces in family medicine, a feat that would require expansion beyond the confines of McMaster’s main campus.

The project gained momentum again in 2011. The timeline for the revived project anticipated completion of the project by 2013, with construction to begin in January 2012.

“As the University has been finalizing the purchase of the site, a transaction that is now essentially complete, a great deal of pre-construction work has been underway,” said Gord Arbeau, Associate Director of Public Relations for McMaster.

Construction is now set to begin in the spring of 2012, with an anticipated completion in 2014.

Currently located at 100 Bay St. is the Hamilton-Wentworth District School Board office. With McMaster’s transactions largely complete, the relocation is awaiting confirmation on the agreement between the Hamilton-Wentworth District School Board and the City, “on the space it will occupy while it builds its permanent education centre,” explained Arbeau.

Meanwhile McMaster is eagerly awaiting the new beginning on the horizon. “All the teams and departments that will relocate to the health campus have been actively involved in planning their moves, providing guidance to the design team and working to make sure we are on track,” said Arbeau.

The project is an enormous undertaking for the City of Hamilton and McMaster. It will see 4,000 students and approximately 54,000 patient visits each year, as well as 450 full-time employees.

The new building will house McMaster’s Department of Family Medicine, the Shelter Health Network, the Women’s Maternity Clinic, as well as research and continuing education programs through the Faculty of Health Sciences.

“Among other things, the McMaster Health Campus will provide both important learning opportunities for the students of many health professions, as well as an innovative family health clinic for Hamilton citizens,” said David Price, Chair of the Department of Family Medicine for McMaster’s Michael G. DeGroote School of Medicine.