This project marks one of the first major renovations since the Landmark Medical Center was founded in 1988. The hospital provides health care services for more than 175,000 patients on a yearly basis.

“We are excited to see the completion of this outstanding facility,” said Tony Cavallaro, president of JACA Architects, in a statement. “We are proud to contribute to the overall quality of care provided by the Landmark Cancer Center, and hope that Landmark patients will benefit greatly from the considerations designed within the center.”

To incorporate a more sustainable design, Landmark Medical center replaced an outdated exterior storefront and installed, larger, more heat reflective windows, according to a statement. A new, energy-efficient HVAC system was also installed to heat and cool the building.

Designers also incorporated large windows and used natural light to help facilitate a calmer and more healing environment, according to a statement.

In order to make patients as comfortable as possible during their stay at Landmark, designers included individual lighting controls, video controls and Wi-Fi in each room. Additional accommodations were included for families who are spending the night.

One major challenge JACA faced was developing a design that matched the floor plan of other facilities located on the Rehabilitation Hospital of Rhode Island’s campus. During the design process, architects were able to maintain the majority of the patient room layouts and plumbing features while creating the enough space for different departments in the hospital.

According to a statement from JACA, the project cost over $3 million to build and design and construction began in fall of 2015.

JACA Architects has been involved in large-scale construction projects since 1991. They specialize in designing medical and senior-living facilities as well as health care centers.

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The contest required firms to design a small hospital and surrounding campus with net-zero energy consumption, suitable for a semi-rural area in Southern California, but adaptable to other areas. Net-zero energy consumption refers to the fact that a building provides all of its own energy from sustainable and/or renewable sources. As winners, Aditazz, M+NLB and Perkins+Will are eligible to contract with Kaiser for a small hospital project, tentatively planned for Southern California.

The Aditazz proposal features a three-story hospital with a partial fourth floor and 188 total beds. The design calls for a hospital featuring a “floating roof” over-arching canopy, covered by a large number of solar panels, which will contribute to energy savings and block the buildings below from various forms of exposure, lowering the costs and building requirements for them significantly.

The Aditazz entry explained that this extra layer of protection from the effects of the sun will do some of the work usually accomplished by the facilities themselves, meaning, “the building envelope can be comprised of straight-forward, cost-effective materials and assemblies.”

The proposal calls for a large courtyard, also under this protective canopy, allowing space for community events like farmers’ markets and providing outdoor seating for food services. The solar canopy in this area will be used as the framework for hanging banners, artwork and tapestries to enliven the space.

The MNLB collaboration with Perkins+Will calls for a three-story hospital with a maximum of 132 beds. The concept involves a Wellness Pavilion on the ground level, which doubles as the front door to the facility and will offer educational services. The area will also include retail space, as well as private dining facilities to increase the feel of melding public space with medical services to create a warm welcoming environment.

Patient bathrooms are set along headwalls with continuous rails to reduce falls, while the patient’s rooms feature noise-reduction strategies to improve the quality of sleep. Smart bed technology allows the staff to monitor when patients leave their beds. The design features an energy use index approximately 75 percent lower than the regional average. This effect was achieved with solar energy, a high-performance envelope, ground-source heat pumps in place of boilers and a geothermal well-field instead of cooling towers.

The Gresham, Smith and Partners design includes automated guided vehicles (AVGs), essentially robots that transport materials throughout the facility. AVGs can be programmed to operate during off-peak hours, saving the funds required to pay four full-time employees. The facility achieves net-zero energy use by covering its parking lots with shade devices, featuring 300,000 square feet of solar panels, providing enough energy to power 75 percent of the hospital’s annual energy use. Either one large wind turbine or two smaller ones would be located in the northeast corner of the site, providing the rest of the power.

These are very forward-looking designs and the information provided here is merely the tip of the iceberg. Detailed proposals for all three designs can be found at http://design.kpnfs.com/winners.html

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