• The hospital is also designed in such a way that it has future wards and consulting blocks that can be added as and when required with minimal disruption to the hospital operations ; this includes additional parking .
• To comply fully with the department of health requirements as well as all local national building regulations and the SANS10400 guidelines on energy efficiency in the building .
• Finally to stay within the green building principles and guidelines that Netcare have developed to make their hospitals more sustainable and energy efficient .
Innovative Design Development The expansion plan was part of the planning from the start . The northern blocks were left out so that the hospital could expand without disruption to the existing operations . Expansion was planned for doctors , additional wards , an oncology bunker , additional theatres on the north façade , and an EP laboratory that would be part of the cluster of the catheterization laboratories at the end of the theatre block .
Parking has always been a constraint at the existing Union and Clinton hospitals and with the consolidated design the parking was consolidated on the site into a super basement that would cater for doctors , staff , and patients with 400 basement parking bays . This is over and above the surface parking for visitors at the front of the hospital as well as additional surface parking for staff at the back of house / service area of the hospital . The hospital will have 829 parking bays of which 30 bays are for wheelchair access parking .
The site is in a seismic activity area and the structure is designed to cater for seismic activity with shear walls , columns and slabs that are specifically reinforced . A hospital is considered a building for which structural integrity during earthquakes is of vital importance for protection and refuge . In the SANS 10160 design code this is ensured through the introduction of an importance factor which increases the design earthquake load by 40 % compared to ‘ ordinary ’ buildings .
less wet works and a reduced drying time on the internal finishes . Drywalling is also insulated to reduce the DB levels in the building .
The internal separations are brickwork for fire compartmentalisation , structural stability , and noise reduction . Within these compartments the drywalling is further insulated for sound attenuation . Research has shown that hospitals are increasingly becoming noisy with background noise , machines beeping and monitoring and the sound of patients and staff . Therefore any attenuation will increase the patient and staff levels of comfort .
Sustainable Elements The envelope design is to minimise heat loss and heat gain in the building . The windows are vertical to fit into the shear walls and the size is as consistent as possible to have a limited number of window types ( reduce cost and production and assembly time ) and the glass is low-e glass which further insulates the interior from heat gain .
There is 100mm thick polystyrene on the roof slab to insulate the roof slab . Once the mechanical engineers ran the heat gain models , they recommended some sun louvres on the windows for glare but otherwise the building envelope is thermally efficient .
The flat slabs on the roof were planned to have Photo Voltaic panels which will assist with the electricity generation and reduce the hospitals energy consumption . This will be implemented soon with approximately 5,000m 2 of roof space utilised .
Use of Drywall The structure is also designed with a 1 column failure principle which makes the structure rock solid . To offset this solid superstructure the designers looked at using drywall internally . This led to a 10 % saving on the structure and helped to lighten the load on the piled foundations .
The drywalling has evolved so that the drywall boards are fit to purpose , with wet boards for bathrooms , fire rated walls for fire compartments and heavy-duty boards to handle additional weight on the wall . The combination of the various boards also meant a faster construction time with
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