C.W. Driver has completed construction on the renovation and modernization of the East Tower Nursing Unit at Sharp Grossmont Hospital, located just east of San Diego in La Mesa, California. The $26 million project delivers facility upgrades local taxpayers approved on the June 2006 voter ballot. Construction on the 71,000-square-foot project began in May 2012 and completed in October 2015. "¨"¨ 

C.W. Driver is a premier builder serving California since 1919. As a leader in general contracting and construction management services, remaining on the cutting-edge across a broad spectrum of industries, including education, commercial/office, technology, healthcare/biomedical, mixed-use, assisted living, entertainment, retail, industrial and civic. C.W. Driver serves "Fortune 500" companies and institutional clients. 

The Grossmont Healthcare District (GHD) is an East County regional public agency that supports various health-related community programs and services in San Diego's East County. Formed in 1952 to build and operate Grossmont Hospital, the District is governed by a five-member board of directors, each elected to four-year terms, who represent more than 500,000 people residing within the District's 750 square miles. 

Necessary Upgrades

Originally built in 1974, the seven-story hospital tower required upgrades to the infrastructure and renovation of its second through fifth floors. Partnering with architecture firm, Stantec, Inc., C.W. Driver completed renovations at each level, including upgrades to nursing units, entry corridors and elevator lobbies, in addition to the conversion of four semi-private patient rooms to meet Americans with Disabilities Act Accessibility (ADA) guidelines and the replacement of patient utility management head-walls. To modernize the infrastructure, C.W. Driver upgraded mechanical, electrical and plumbing (MEP), updating all elevator cars and controls, the hospital information system, and the building's lighting and finishes."¨"¨

"As with most hospital renovations, the need to keep existing areas and systems operational during construction presents a considerable challenge to the project team," said Rich Freeark, Senior Vice President of C.W. Driver's San Diego operations.  "As such, C.W. Driver worked closely with Grossmont Healthcare District to coordinate the delivery of each phase of construction in order to minimize the impact to the hospital's staff and patients. The result of our successful collaboration is a modernized facility that will serve the La Mesa community for years to come.""¨"¨

Lessening Disruptions

With the renovation located directly above active operating rooms, C.W. Driver worked with the hospital operations team to design a plan to mitigate any disruptions to the hospital's on-going operations. Throughout the duration of the project, C.W. Driver carefully coordinated with sub-contractors, to properly contain noise, vibration, dust and handling of construction materials.  Demolition was performed during off-hours and all carts were covered to diminish any potential contamination in the corridors while debris was being removed.

To further limit the construction's impact on hospital operations, noise and vibration activities were identified in the project schedule and communicated in advance to the Sharp team members to properly coordinate necessary stoppages. C.W. Driver also established specific protocol for unplanned requests for such stoppages, including appropriate steps to be followed.

In addition to Freeark, the C.W. Driver project management team members include Greg Palmer, Project Director; Eric Schultz, Project Manager; Daniel Moreno, Superintendent; Mike McConkey, Senior Superintendent; Peter Kovacs, Quality Control Manager; and Mike Zoller, Safety Manager. "¨

Citizens Approve Funding

Taxpayers financed the renovation and modernization at the publicly owned hospital, which opened in 1955. GHD serves as landlord of the hospital's property and buildings on behalf of taxpayers. The East Tower's renovation cost was financed through Proposition G, a $247 million bond measure sponsored by GHD and approved by East County voters on the June 2006 ballot. Prop. G passed by more than 77 percent, well above the two-thirds required. As proposed in the hospital's Facilities Master Site Plan, Prop. G is funding several infrastructure construction hospital improvements, including the East Tower project. The bond-financed construction began in 2007, and is scheduled to continue over the next several years. Prop. G also is currently funding construction of a 71,000-square-foot Heart and Vascular (H&V) Center and 18,000-square-foot Central Energy Plant (CEP).

The $60 million three-story H&V Center will eventually expand the hospital's surgery capabilities with four new cardiac catheterization labs and four multipurpose procedural rooms that can support a wide range of specialties, including general surgery, minimally invasive surgery and image-guided surgery, as well as endovascular interventional procedures. In addition to the building, the current construction phase includes a new loading dock and materials receiving department on the lowest level, a new pharmacy and laboratory on the middle floor and shell space on the top floor for the new surgical floor build-out. Completion of the building is scheduled for mid-2016 with completion of the surgical floor is scheduled for late 2018.

The $47 million, two-story CEP will help meet future energy capacity needs of the hospital with new emergency generators, boilers, chillers, cooling towers and auxiliary systems, along with a new cogeneration energy system funded by Sharp HealthCare. The cogeneration system includes a 52-ton, 4.4-megawatt combustion turbine generator manufactured by San Diego-based Solar Turbines. The CEP also will contain a new control room that will monitor heating and refrigeration equipment, medical air and vacuum pumps. The new CEP is expected to save millions of dollars in energy costs, plus reduce the hospital's emission of greenhouse gas pollutants by 90 percent, GHD officials said. The new CEP was constructed with 131 tons of reinforced steel bars surrounded by 4.23 million pounds of concrete with a 106-by-70-foot concrete foundation slab that is 4 feet thick. Completion of the CEP is scheduled for the early part of this year.

The Grossmont Healthcare District project at Sharp Grossmont Hospital is one of a number of projects in which C.W. Driver has been involved within the healthcare industry, including the 7,600-square-foot Ramona Ambulatory Care Center outpatient medical clinic in Ramona, California; and the 56,000-square-foot Meridian medical office building for Kaiser Permanente in Riverside, California; and the 32,200-square-foot Foothill medical office building for Kaiser Permanente in Pasadena, California.