Balfour Beatty has been joined by Grant Shapps, the MP for Welwyn Garden City and Hatfield, to mark the latest phase in the creation of the new £23 million Queen Elizabeth II Hospital.
The four-storey facility in Welwyn Garden City, being built for the Assemble Community Partnership, is approximately half way to its completion, and consists of 8,542 m2 of clinical and community space.
It will provide an urgent care centre, open 24 hours a day, which will treat a wide range of minor illnesses and injuries, an outpatient unit, a diagnostics centre, GP services, a purpose-built area for outpatient children’s services, a breast unit, ante /post-natal care, and ‘much more’.
Joining Balfour Beatty and Grant Shapps MP and Kevin Atkinson, Balfour Beatty director of operations, Construction Services UK, for the exclusive preview of the new hospital, were local GPs, a hospital consultant and hospital volunteers, before a short ‘topping out’ ceremony.
Working in partnership with architects, Penoyre & Prasad, to implement an ‘environmentally friendly’ building, Balfour Beatty is providing a green roof, solar panels, air source heat pumps, and natural ventilation, that will reduce energy consumption in the building’s operation. Diagnostic rooms are designed to enable multi-use.
To ensure that existing healthcare services remain unaffected, the new facility is being constructed next to the existing QEII Hospital with services due to be transferred when complete. Building began in April 2013, and is scheduled to complete next spring.
