DMC $60M Construction Projects Begin

Detroit Medical Center has announced construction contracts totaling more than $60 million for architectural designs, engineering, and construction management, the first phase of a $300 million capital improvement initiative.

The projects were promised in the eight-hospital health system's $1.5 billion acquisition by private, for-profit Vanguard Health Systems, Inc.

"What better way to start the new year than by moving forward with eight DMC construction projects?" Michael Duggan, president/CEO of DMC system, says. "We promised our patients, our employees and the City of Detroit that we would aggressively move in the bulldozers and forklifts once the agreement was final. Today we start fulfilling that promise---and this is just the beginning."

Contracts totaling $50 million dollars went to the DMC Children's Hospital of Michigan Specialty Center and to private room renovation at DMC Huron Valley-Sinai Hospital.

Two architectural projects are the Cardiovascular Institute and Multispecialty Building, a five-story, 150,000-square-foot building, and the Sinai-Grace Hospital Emergency Department expansion, which will double the ED and add 46 ICU beds.

The five-story, 105,550-square-foot Children's Hospital expansion will house a pediatrics clinic, adolescent medicine, outpatient rehabilitation, specialty clinics, and 200 physician office suites for outpatient services. Children's Hospital served nearly a quarter of a million outpatient and emergency department patients in 2009. The center represents the first expansion of the DMC central campus in almost three decades.

The contracts for architectural work totaling $10 million are:

• Central, unified lobby at Harper University Hospital, awarded to Neumann Smith. The $10.7 million dollar project starts this summer.
• Surgical services renovation at Harper University Hospital, awarded to HKS. The $23 million dollar project starts this summer.
• Unit renovations at Harper University Hospital, awarded to Stuckey Vitale. The $8 million dollar project starts this fall.
• New operating and pre/post operating room at Detroit Receiving Hospital, awarded to Stuckey Vitale. The $8.4 million dollar project starts this fall.
• Cardiovascular Institute and Multispecialty Building, awarded to Harley Ellis Devereaux. The $110 million dollar project starts in fall of 2011.
• Sinai-Grace Hospital Emergency Department expansion, awarded to Smith Group. The $77 million dollar project starts in fall of 2011.