Tehachapi's Online Community News & Entertainment Guide
Tehachapi's Online Community News & Entertainment Guide
The Forde Files No 81
The entry to the Tehachapi Critical Care Replacement Hospital will welcome patients and visitors in gracious style. To the left in the photo, the obstetrics wing is now covered in yellow DensGlass sheathing.
Marc Bendlin of Tehachapi, general foreman for Lyles Mechanical (plumbing), studies plans.
Ironworker Will Mittel of JA Sanders prime contractor of Visalia displays steady balance high on the steel beams.
Magellan Drive -- newly completed with curbs, sidewalks and utilities -- leads directly to the hospital, whose address is 2000 Magellan Dr. In the background to the north are the rolling hills of the Broome family's Loop Ranch. The late John Broome donated to the city the 22 acres on which the hospital is being built. The California High Speed Rail line proposed track location runs behind the hospital at the base of those hills.
A "water wall" in the open atrium at the center of the structure will spill into a pond with a wheelchair friendly bridge. Left center, the interior of the admitting lobby and waiting room.
A rendering of the hospital by SWA Architects of Pasadena and Phoenix. From left in the drawing, medical-surgical and ICU wing, obstetrics wing, entry and the non-OSHPD (Office of Statewide Health Planning and Development ) administration building.
The battle-scarred Tehachapi Critical Care Replacement Hospital is emerging triumphant as skilled crews give it form and substance.
The 66,000-square-foot. $90 million project currently may be $23 million short of funds that will be needed to finish it, but as the shape, vitality, power and beauty of the building present themselves, completing the hospital as planned is the realistic manifestation of a big vision. The community will be proud of this building.
While architect Stephen Wen, AIA, on presenting the hospital plans several years ago, said, "There is no fat in this program. It is pure muscle, pure functional," he did not neglect to incorporate into his design the structural graciousness that makes people feel good.
One such design element is the "water wall" water feature built in the open-air atrium at the center of the structure. The atrium is the heart of a central corridor covered by a soaring ceiling that bisects the building. To the west, off the sun-splashed cafeteria/dietary section, a labyrinth walk is to be built.
This is a building that will heal both body and soul.
A year-long delay during a CEQA (California Environmental Quality Act) challenge and further difficulties with a prime contractor and loss of Inspector of Record that slowed construction for another six months have been costly. The Tehachapi Valley Healthcare District Board of Directors is studying ways to secure additional funding as well as ways to pursue "value engineering" – that is, finding alternative ways to meet the rigid state of California requirements.
Key words are "shell" and "phased construction," meaning that while the buildings will be completed, some rooms may not be equipped and put into service right away.
Consultant Gary Hicks recommended that the district reduce costs through value engineering; reduce the FF&E ("furniture, fixtures and equipment") budget; phase in non-essential patient care components; consider ad valorem or parcel taxes, seek grants, build cash reserves, update the strategic plan, maintain debt capacity based on current financial metrics and seek contributions from the local community, offering naming rights to major donors.
