Commissioned by Walsall Healthcare Trust, the emergency department will provide more capacity and better facilities.
As recently as August 2020, project costs were put at £36m but they have gone up 10% since then. Now it is expected to cost £40m.
The new 5,400 sqm department has been designed to provide one central destination for all patients and visitors, bringing together previously separate pathways.
Tilbury Douglas (formerly Interserve Construction) is building the new department next to the current accident and emergency (A&E) facility, which will later also be reconfigured and refurbished, providing additional space for the hospital on completion of the new build.
Tilbury Douglas was appointed through the Procure 22 framework in 2019 and has since developed the project in collaboration with the client’s design team, including BDP, and has delivered significant enabling works, including remediation, archaeological works, road reconfiguration and piling.
Main works started at the end of May, with an overall completion date of autumn 2022.
Ned Hobbs, Walsall Healthcare’s chief operating officer, said: “A five-month programme of enabling work has now been completed during which time we’ve seen the widening of the blue light route for ambulances as well as mine workings carried out and the installation of more than 460 piles to support the steel frame.
“The new ambulance parking area outside the old Emergency Department entrance has also been completed.
“So much has already been achieved but when the main phase gets underway that is when the whole project will suddenly seem much more for those of us who are watching its progress with such excitement. In just over a year’s time we will have a fantastic new addition to Walsall Manor Hospital that will provide a massive improvement to our healthcare services.”
Tilbury Douglas regional managing director Simon Butler said: “This development clearly illustrates our ability to deliver complex projects in the healthcare sector.”
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