Aventura Hospital and Medical Center

Centex Rodgers Builds a High-Rise Tower for South Florida Hospital

Aventura Hospital and Medical Center plans to start moving into its new $130 million facility by late spring. The hospital features a structural steel frame structure with precast concrete exterior skin.

"We needed to bring our facility, from a technology and customer-service standpoint, into the 21st Century," said Davide M. Carbone, Aventura Hospital's chief executive officer. "The replacement of a majority of our patient rooms was one of our unique challenges."

The nine-story, 146-ft. tower includes 245 private rooms, a 26-bed emergency department, two intensive-care units and 10 new operating rooms. In addition to the nine functioning floors, two others are being used as interstitial space and mainly house mechanical equipment.

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"This project is atypical in that it is a high-rise, and no one builds a high-rise hospital in the state of Florida," said Tom Koulouris, construction manager for project owner HCA. "Very tight site restraints are what drove that."

Nashville-based Centex Rodgers, with offices in Palm Beach Gardens, Fla., received the contract and began sitework on the multiphased project in spring 2001. Construction costs on the structure are approximately $90 million, which includes a parking garage and renovation to the existing building. The contractor is adding a new EIFS exterior and hurricane wind-resistant windows to the old facility.

Craig Eckert serves as project manager for Centex Rodgers.

Before Centex Rodgers could start constructing the tower, it had to build a six-story, 815-space parking garage, which opened in November 2001; tear down an existing garage attached to the functioning hospital; and relocate underground utility lines.

To save more space, Aventura located the central energy plant on adjacent property across the street from the hospital. Crews trenched across two city streets and skirted a Miami-Dade County sewage lift station to bring supply-and-return chilled-water pipes and an emergency electrical duct bank to the new facility.

The structure evolves

Aventura began planning the addition in 1995 and received corporate funding for a three-story addition in 1999. Architects Gresham Smith and Partners of Tampa designed that structure with the potential for 15 stories.

By 2001, Aventura had the money to add the patient-room floors. Future plans still include three more floors and additional elevators.

"The biggest limitation was whatever we built was an expansion, not a replacement facility, and so it had to work with the existing facility," Carbone said. "The existing facility was never designed for acute care."

The Teamsters union built the structure in 1974 as a rehabilitation hospital but never moved in. It later opened as a community hospital. The first three floors are only 12 ft. from slab to slab. And the remaining floors have about 10-ft., 6 in. of clearance.

"Typically in health-care projects, you need a lot more room than that because of the amount of utilities that go above the ceiling," said Matt Harrell, architect for the project. "We have a pretty significant HVAC system that requires special filtration and air volume, with return and supply."

Harrell said the new floors will be double high. The new second level aligns with the existing third floor and the new third, with the existing fifth floor.

Corridors will connect the two buildings. A domed rotunda with wood accents and warm colors will give the new entry space the appearance of a hospitality facility rather than a medical center.

A main central nurse station, with decentralized support spaces and bedside charting, allows the 42-room patient floors to function as a single unit. Charting and workstations are interspersed near patient rooms. Some flex rooms have been designed to function as intensive-care beds if needed. Upper-floor windows offer striking views of the ocean and surrounding community.

Work commences

When Centex began working on the tower, it leased nearby property to assist with dewatering. Excavations for pile caps were 12 to 14 ft. below grade. It pumped water continuously for three months into a temporary lake, and the water eventually percolated back into the ground.

After demolishing the existing garage, Centex unexpectedly found concrete piles, which had to be extracted before starting to drive new piles to support the structure. As-built drawings did not exist.

Crews drilled nearly 700 16-in., 40-ft. long auger-cast piles for the foundation. To monitor noise and vibrations, Centex Rodgers sent personnel into the existing hospital to assess any problems. It coordinated closely with hospital operations personnel and stopped vibratory compacting a couple of times when certain surgeries were taking place.

The new building rose close to the existing structure, and patients could watch the progress.

"We were hanging precast panels that weighed 42,000 lbs. right next to the existing building, within 2 in.," Eckert said. "We were nervous but made sure we had our measures in place."

The project has had 35 subcontractors and about 300 workers.

"We tried to emphasize using local participation as much as possible," Eckert said. "The majority of subcontractors are locally based."

Koulouris said the "showcase" project has progressed smoothly once permitting was obtained. All phases, including renovations to the existing structure, should be complete by late fall.

Useful Sources:

• http://www.centex-construction.com/ourcompanies/rodgers.asp
  
• www.aventurahospital.com