Petition for a full study of all UMC options

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Times-Pic on UMC Board Meeting

Here.

Note the contradiction in the Board's approach - yes, we'll do an independent study now...but, based on the state's site prep. presentation yesterday, we're going to do the exact same thing LSU and the state have been pushing all along:

UMC Chairman Bobby Yarborough said the new round of consulting conforms to Gov. Bobby Jindal's recent charge for the board to craft an independent plan that cannot be labeled as belonging to LSU or any other interest.


Still, the board is not expected to deviate from the concept of a multibuilding campus -- patient towers, a diagnostics and treatment building, an ambulatory care-medical office building and support facilities -- on the Mid-City footprint, despite a continued push from some planners and activists to build anew inside a gutted Charity shell.

Bottom line: Jerry Jones can beat his chest as much as he wants.  There's still a great deal of uncertainty about this project's ability to come to fruition.

Congress for the New Urbanism sends letter to HUD about UMC design

"This management corporation has no money."

That interesting quote was uttered yesterday at the UMC Board Meeting (or UMCMC, University Medical Center Management Corporation). 

Much of the meeting featured somewhat pedantic input from a national consultant, whose appearance was funded by LSU, about different types of hospital arrangements. 

The continued discussion about what type of hospital to put on the site at this point in the game begs some huge questions.  For example, why have the state and its contractors expropriated and demolished property in a national historic district when they don't even know what type of hospital is going to be built?

Adequate financing, too, is still not in hand.

When the consultant showed a flowchart-type diagram of his understanding of the hospital arrangement for the complex proposed for the LSU Footprint, the audience literally chuckled out loud at the complexity of the image:

There is also clearly some simmering tension under the surface between LSU and several of the other schools with seats on the board.  As one board member noted, nothing beyond placement on the board has really been worked out amongst all the component schools.  And another board member noted that the design has "a number of barriers" - it's unclear how all the players will play together and how funds will be exchanged.

Other slides outlined the challenges in reduced federal funding starting in 2014 will complicate things for teaching hospitals.  It was made clear, yet again, that nobody really knows how the changes from Obamacare will impact hospitals, especially a hospital that is still very much in the planning stages.

And still, as one member of the UMCMC Board noted, as if it somehow made everything okay, "We got geniuses in the room."

What about the existing parking deck in the LSU Footprint?

One of the handful of concessions Mayor Landrieu was able to wrangle from the state with respect to the design of the UMC hospital was a commitment to build not just the planned one, but two multi-level parking structures along Tulane Avenue.  This ostensibly helps to alleviate the excess of surface-level parking that was planned for the site; apparently green space is going to fill some of that expanse. 

But in the final design presented at the UMC Board meeting late last year, the illustration shows the existing parking ramp on the site, shown above at S. Derbigny and Cleveland Avenue (the front is on Canal Street), as demolished, along with the adjacent Grand Palace Hotel.  Then again, the final design didn't actually incorporate the concessions made to the Mayor - the architect presenter simply noted on the original design where the second parking ramp would go.

Why not keep the existing parking ramp intact, though?  The block is otherwise shown as becoming surface level parking, and unless there are some sort of hidden, crippling structural problems, it seems unwise to demolish an existing higher capacity parking structure with a minimized footprint to make way for reduced capacity lots that take up more room for the same number of cars...especially when higher capacity structures are going to be built new elsewhere on the site.

It can be done

McDonogh No. 11 School can be saved and incorporated into a reconfigured UMC design.

Still Slated for Destruction

McDonogh No. 11 School

The plans for the UMC Hospital Footprint still call for large areas of surface-level parking, not actual hospital building.  If the political willpower existed, the design could be reconfigured on the existing footprint to avoid the demise of the school.

UPDATE: Full Landrieu Letter - A 45-day Halt to LSU Footprint Street Closure

This is indeed good news.

Here is the letter from Mayor Landrieu in full:

June 17, 2010
Timmy Teepell
Chief of Staff
Office of the Governor
Louisiana State Capitol
Baton Rouge, LA 70802


Dear Mr. Teepell:
As you know, as Mayor of the City of New Orleans, I have an obligation and a deep commitment to ensure that as we rebuild from Hurricane Katrina, we create the most livable and economically vibrant City possible. That is why I am appreciative of your support for my administration’s effort to undertake a short 45-day architectural peer review to improve the design of the LSU University Medical Center and to suggest improvements that will increase its functionality as a medical center, improve its integration into the urban landscape, and ensure its success as an economic engine for the City of New Orleans and State of Louisiana.


I have instructed the New Orleans City Planning Commission to ask their contractor, Goody Clancy along with a small group of highly regarded architects and planners, including those with experience designing medical and research centers, to review the current design plans for the LSU University Medical Center and make suggestions for how they can be improved in ways that are consistent with the New Orleans Master Plan and the development of our Comprehensive Zoning Ordinance.


I look forward to working with Jerry Jones and his architects and would ask that you direct them to cooperate fully with my design review team so the process can be done as quickly and efficiently as possible.


Thank you for your commitment and service to our State.


Sincerely,


Mitchell J. Landrieu
Mayor, City of New Orleans

Now...hopefully the design review team considers what would be the best option if the old Charity building is not in play...consolidation of the yet unbuilt VA medical center and the LSU center on the LSU site.  That option would keep many historic homes in the dense VA site from being demolished and it would keep development below S. Galvez Street, which just makes sense.

ADDED: Several hours later, the Times-Picayune catches up with a story on the news.