In a unanimous vote, the Los Angeles City Planning Commission moved yesterday to support the proposed expansion of Cedars-Sinai's flagship hospital campus in Beverly Grove.
Aerial view looking southeastCO Architects
The proposed project, submitted to the Planning Department for review in May 2021, calls for razing a surface parking lot and a medical clinic at the intersection of Beverly and San Vicente Boulevards, clearing the way for the construction of 405,000-square-foot tower with 203 patient beds.
Los Angeles-based CO Architects is designing the expansion, which would consist of a nine-story building standing nearly 176 feet in height. The mid-rise structure would have an exterior of stone, masonry, aluminum, steel, and glass.
Construction of the project will also require the approval of a zone change and other entitlements by the Los Angeles City Council.
Aerial view looking westCO Architects
Cedars-Sinai's plans for its main Beverly Grove hospital result from the Alfred E. Alquist Hospital Facilities Seismic Safety Act, a 1983 which requires that all of the state's acute care hospitals should be able to capable of withstanding a major earthquake by the year 2030. Hospitals across Los Angeles are now being retrofitted or rebuilt to comply with the law - with the alternative being removal from acute care service.
Cedars, according to its entitlement application, has proposed the new patient tower to accommodate the retrofit of its North and South Patient Towers and Professional Tower, all of which are nearly 50 years in age. Replacing the three buildings has been deemed prohibitively expensive, while a retrofit would disrupt patient care and reduce the hospital's capacity during the course of construction. However, adding a new tower prior to starting the retrofit would permit Cedars to continue operating at current levels during the retrofit, trimming the timeline of a project that would otherwise take as many as 20 years to complete.
The potential expansion of the main campus is the third large seismic retrofit project in which Cedars-Sinai is currently engaged. In the San Fernando Valley, Cedars has partnered with Providence Health Systems on an expansion and revamp of the Providence-Cedars-Sinai Tarzana Medical Center, which is currently under construction. On the Westside, Cedars is planning to rebuild its aging Marina Del Rey Hospital with a larger mid-rise building.
Site plan for hospital expansionAHBE|MIG
