St. Joseph Outpatient Center

Teamwork leads to successful outpatient center

By Sean Ryan

The St. Joseph Outpatient Center project is a story of people and businesses banding together to beat the hourglass.

"What made the project a success was pulling together everyone on the project team," said Kristin Ruethling Dufek, architect with Eppstein Uhen Architects Inc., Milwaukee. "It was really the teamwork that made it a success."

During the planning stages, Covenant Healthcare was forced to trim eight months from the construction schedule of the $45 million building on Highway 100 in Wauwatosa. That left general contractor Hunzinger Construction Co., Brookfield, with 10 months to tear down two hotels and a parking garage and replace them with a 210,000-square-foot ambulatory care center loaded with high-tech equipment and an 836-stall parking ramp.

Mike Kelly, chief estimator for subcontractor Olympic Wall Systems, credits Hunzinger for coordinating the project so that its subs could stay on course.

"There were a lot of questions, a lot of things that had to be coordinated on a daily basis," he said. "Everybody had a decent experience there because the contractor was able to organize."

The shortened schedule meant work began before construction drawings were completed, so Hunzinger and its team had to juggle a continuous influx of change orders, Kelly said. There were 62 drawing revisions during the last four months of the project.

"They kept the flow about the job," Kelly said. "At times, there would be five or six of these construction bulletins for the next day, and then you had to go back and see what was affected and what had to be changed, and sometimes things had to be ripped up."

	Project Name: St. Joseph Outpatient Center Location: Wauwatosa Submitting Companies: Hunzinger Construction Co., Brookfield; Olympic Wall Systems Inc., Brookfield; Eppstein Uhen Architects Inc., Milwaukee General Contractor: Hunzinger Construction Co. Architect: Eppstein Uhen Architects Inc. and The BLM Group, Philadelphia Engineer: Arnold and O'Sheridan Inc., Brookfield, structural and civil engineer; Harwood Engineering Consultants Ltd., Milwaukee, mechanical, electrical and plumbing engineer Owner: Covenant Healthcare, Milwaukee Project Cost: $45 million Start Date: July 2002 Completion Date: May 2003

The project crew of 700 had to work seven days a week, on two alternating shifts each day, to wrap things up before the May deadline. They bolted together more than 1,000 tons of structural steel, poured more than 13,000 cubic yards of concrete and put up 17,440 sheets of drywall, which, if stacked, would create a 760-ton pile reaching as high as a 78-story building.

The intense construction schedule created a building that was designed to comfort people. Dufek said that since most people hate to go to hospitals, the design team tried to create a health-care building that doesn't look like one. That meant lots of openings for natural light, natural building materials and natural patterns, such as leaves, on the carpets.

"Not only is the technology in the building new, but it allows patients to stay in a building where they want to be," Dufek said. "This is a trend that we're seeing more and more in health care. It's about making health care more friendly."