Clark Construction Group LLC

Architect:

Wilmot Sanz, Inc.

Client:

Inova Health System

Scope Of Work

Inova Women's Hospital & Children's Hospital is the largest phase of Inova Health System's capital improvement program, a multi-year effort to upgrade its Fairfax campus into a world-class environment for patient care, education, and research.

The Women's Hospital and Children's Hospital will cohabitate in a 665,000 square-foot, 12-story structure. The Women's Hospital contains 192 patient rooms on four floors, a 108-bed neonatal intensive care unit, 33 labor and delivery rooms, six C-section suites, and eight operating rooms. Clark also constructed support areas, a ground-floor clinic, and a kitchen. The Children's Hospital occupies three floors of the building, with its own dedicated entrance, and contains 116 private pediatric rooms. The entire facility connects to the campus' existing South Patient Tower on the three lower levels.

The hospital's cast-in-place concrete structure is wrapped in an architectural precast skin with glazed curtain wall and ribbon windows. Custom entry canopies greets all hospital visitors, while green roofs and a healing garden enhance sustainability and provide a natural respite.

The Inova Women's Hospital & Children's Hospital project also included the construction of a new central utility plant and a central energy plant with two 1,800-ton chillers, cooling towers, and 13 custom air handling units to provide 3,300 tons of added cooling load. The hospital is equipped with three two-megawatt emergency generators with paralleling gear to provide continuous electricity in the event of an emergency.

Sustainability

The project has achieved  Silver certification. Sustainable features include low-flow plumbing, water cisterns, a rain garden and native plantings to reduce water consumption. In addition, there is a highly-efficient energy system and insulation, as well as a white roof and sun control windows to reduce heat build-up and lower air conditioning consumption. Solar panels capture energy to power outdoor entrance canopy lights at night.

Lean Construction

Through the use of the Lean Construction practice referred to as pull planning, Clark, along with the owner Inova Health System, architect of record Wilmot Sanz, Inc., mechanical, electrical, and plumbing designer, RMF Engineering, Inc., and a number of key subcontractors engaged the project's foremen in the planning and scheduling process to define activities, durations, and hand-offs between trades to complete the work in the most efficient and cost effective manner possible. As a result of the team's seamless turnover processes, Inova was able to provide care to their patients ahead of schedule.

"The first punchlist-ready space for the Women's Hospital has proven to be an opportunity for the Clark team to exceed our firm's expectations for cleanliness and readiness. Clark's whole-team approach has paid dividends towards the quality and overall success of the project," Su Kim, Interior Designer, Wilmot Sanz.

S2N Technology

S2N, a technology contractor and wholly-owned subsidiary of Clark, was selected as the Inova's integration and low voltage consultant, as well as project manager for the structured cabling, access control, CCTV, nurse call, and real-time locating systems. Real-time locating systems (RTLS) were used to automatically identify and track the location of objects or people in real time, usually within a building or other contained .