
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: TUESDAY, March 26, 1991                   TAG: 9103260558
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: B-2   EDITION: EVENING 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Short

SITE WORK TO BEGIN ON HOSPITAL ADDITION

About $2.5 million in preconstruction work for an eight-story addition at Roanoke Memorial Hospital will begin in mid-April, hospital officials said.

Initial site work includes a new private road to replace two public streets that have been closed to make room for the hospital's new glass-walled tower.

Construction of the $55 million structure should begin no later than January 1992, officials said.

The 300,000-square-foot addition includes a new emergency room and trauma center, three intensive-care units and cardiac operating rooms; an expanded lobby and medical staff offices; and additional parking.

Local contractors will be used as much as possible, officials said.

"The job is being broken up into small bid packages," said Thomas Robertson, president of Carilion Health System, parent company of Roanoke Memorial. "By keeping jobs small, local contractors should have more opportunity to bid."

"I wouldn't be surprised if we get 80 percent local work," added I.B. Heinemann, executive vice president of Carilion.

The new building is designed so it can be expanded an additional seven floors to the same level of the existing hospital tower, officials said. The expansion will house 48 critical-care beds and 75 intermediate-care beds.

Tentative plans call for a helicopter pad to be built on the top of the far south end of the building.

by CNB