Louisville, Ky. – One major difference the new Louisville VA Medical Center will boast over the current Robley Rex VA Medical Center is the addition of two parking garage structures compared to surface lot parking for patients. It’s hoped that these parking garages will be a welcomed addition for patients as they will not only provide more parking but provide shorter distances to the medical center.
One garage will be located on the north side of the medical facility – providing more than 1,200 parking spaces including nearly 90 handicapped spaces. There will also be a south parking garage, which will provide another 1,200 parking spaces for patients that includes another 60 handicapped spaces.
Will Jasper, a quality assurance representative on the project for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Louisville District, said the garages were designed to accommodate the many visitors a facility of this size receives.
“When designing the garages, the designers had to think about many things such as making sure we will have enough parking for all staff, patients, and visitors, and making sure that there will be an easy way to access each of the garages,” he said. “They also needed to take into consideration that some veterans may have issues that prevent them from moving around very well so the access to the hospital needed to be as easy as possible for these people.”
Some of these considerations include having 39 of the many handicapped parking spaces in the north garage on the first floor, as well as walkways from the garages to the medical facility.
While the two parking structures will be fairly similar, there are a few differences, said Nick Shell, a quality assurance representative on the project for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Louisville District.
“The most noticeable difference between the two garages is that the North garage is all above ground, whereas the first level on the South garage will be slightly underground. Because of this, there will be an entrance and an exit on both the first and second floors of the South garage due to the slope it is being placed in,” he said. “The North parking garage will be strictly level with the earth so there will only be access to the medical center via the first floor. Also, the north garage is only six floors whereas the south garage will have seven floors.”
Both the North and South garages are being constructed using precast concrete pieces that are being assembled on-site to create the parking structures.
“These huge pieces are formed and poured in a plant offsite and hauled to the site where they are unloaded and placed together just like a large Lego set. Then when they are set together, the pieces are welded together at tabs in between which helps to hold everything in place,” Jasper explained. “There are also spots on the garage that are unfinished which will get a field applied topping in order to ensure everything drains the correct way once it is complete.”
“After that, there are many other key pieces to the garages that need to be added like the parking finishes, elevators, and stairs before they are complete,” he added.
The North garage will have four elevators on the south end, which is closest to the hospital building, to provide easy access into the ground level of the building. It will also have two stair towers for use.
The construction of the precast concrete pieces for the North garage began in November 2022 and was completed July 2023. It’s expected to be completely finished in September 2024. Work has recently begun on the South garage with drilled pier work for the foundation starting in June 2023.