Today the Board of Regents approved UTMB’s proposal to build a $61 million medical specialty care center on the mainland. The 110,000-square-foot facility will be located on a 35-acre plot the university owns near the intersection of Interstate 45 and FM 646, across from the HEB, near the new Best Buy and in the general area of Victory Lakes. The specialty center is scheduled to open in November 2009; construction should start late this summer. It’ll be part of what is already a well-established and well-regarded mainland presence for UTMB.
The Daily News’ Laura Elder ran an article on this May 8 and there was a good editorial by Heber Taylor (wasn’t able to locate for you), and they sparked a question from a blog reader and friend about why we weren’t out there beating the drum about this important and good news. It’s not been a secret; the plans have been discussed, including at the Health System session of our recent “Mondays in March.” At the same time, getting out ahead of Board of Regents approval with anything more concrete than a plan isn’t really such a great idea for us institutionally. We’ll start hearing and seeing more about this now.
I’m looking forward to the start of construction. One thing I’ve heard discussed is the creation of a park & ride lot on a portion of the property, to help facilitate ride-sharing for commuting employees. It’s just an idea, but it might come together quickly as a partial solution to sky-high fuel costs. More on this topic in a future post.