Infrastructure boost needed ahead of the new hospital opening in St. John's, says mayor

After much anticipation and speculation, the Newfoundland and Labrador government announced the site where a new hospital will be built to eventually replace the St. Clare's Mercy Hospital in St. John's — but the city's mayor says infrastructure will have to be built up to support it.

The new hospital will be built on Nils Way, located off Kenmount Road just west of Kenmount Terrace. Premier Andrew Furey said during Monday's announcement that the site was chosen because it's easily accessible by road and connects St. John's, Mount Pearl, Conception Bay South and Paradise.

On Tuesday, St. John's Mayor Danny Breen said that while location is good, there will need to be changes made to support an additional wave of people through the area.

"There's going to need to be road improvements and there's some discussion around from the Outer Ring Road [going] directly into that area," Breen told CBC Radio's St. John's Morning Show.

"So that's one of our biggest concerns, is making sure that the necessary road work is planned and done up-front to avoid the congestion problems that this could cause. So that's something that will be discussed during the planning stages."

He added another point of concern is accessibility and that work will have to be done to ensure the facility is connected to the public transit system.

St. Clare's is currently based in the west end of downtown St. John's and is accessible by foot and public transportation, whereas the new site isn't as convenient.

"That's why transit will become important," said Breen.

Breen said he's glad the former Grace Hospital near downtown will get a new lease on life when the site is used for a new health-care clinic, which will offer accessible health-care services to people in the area.

At the moment, Breen said, he doesn't know how the area will be impacted when St. Clare's is shuttered, but he doesn't want to see a repeat of the former nurses' residence that stood abandoned for years.

"We also want to make sure that once those buildings are vacated that the province takes steps to have the sites remediated and available for future development," said Breen.

City not initially involved

Breen said he is glad to see another new hospital in the works, pointing out that the Health Sciences Centre is nearing 50 years old.

"It appears to me that this is going to be very positive for the region," he said.

Breen said, initial discussions about the new hospital's location didn't include municipalities.

However, he said, communities did meet with the province later on and he's confident they will be involved in planning the rest of way.

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