Clark Construction employs 3D modeling, laser scanning to solve healthcare project challenges

When it opens in 2023, a new health care facility for MedStar Georgetown University Hospital in Washington, D.C., will element the most current healthcare and technological improvements.

The new 477,213-square-foot healthcare and surgical developing will element 156 client rooms, 32 exam rooms and a rooftop helipad with direct access to 31 operating rooms. An intraoperative MRI procedure with a ceiling-mounted rail system connecting the diagnostic room and adjacent operating rooms will convey the MRI magnet immediately to the individual. In addition, the venture involves a 600-auto, under-grade parking garage, 18 elevators and 6 acres of new green space.

The web site is on the land of the previous Kober-Cogan Creating, which was shut down in May possibly 2010 after the discovery of mold in the constructing and formerly experienced housed the hospital’s psychiatry department. 

That introduced unique issues for the project team, led by Bethesda, Maryland-based mostly Clark Building. Miles of h2o utility lines, a lot of of which were not documented, were managing directly underneath the locale of the new pavilion to feed equally MedStar Georgetown College Healthcare facility and the Georgetown College campus structures. The project crew had to relocate these utilities exterior of the making footprint to allow for the venture to start out.

“The Clark workforce developed and engineered a 250-foot-extensive utility bridge to help chilled drinking water and electrical expert services from the central utility plant to the current MedStar Georgetown Clinic,” said Bradley Hunter, project executive at Clark Design Team. “The bridge set up expected close coordination with mechanical and electrical contractors who mounted the utilities on prefabricated racks which were being then hung from metal beams measuring 60 toes, allowing excavation to start off down below.”

Clark Development, together with architects HKS and Shalom Baranes Associates, assembled a BIM design of the present utilities. As design progressed and the primary framework and caisson areas ended up set, “we executed extra borings at all caisson places and additional educated the BIM excavation design,” stated Hunter.

This preliminary move allowed the Clark workforce to better advise the price tag design with respect to deep foundations and to start off revising the excavation system. With just about 1,000 piles to put in for assistance for the duration of excavation, Clark recorded the true soil and utility problems encountered in authentic-time with each and every pile and enter the info into the BIM design. This drastically increased Clark’s being familiar with of the web page and allowed to continue to revise and resequence the excavation program in advance of the area crews, explained Hunter. 

“At the completion of pile installation, we were equipped to have a hugely extensive profile of the envisioned excavation well in progress of the final stage of excavation,” said Hunter. “With this information and facts, we have been in a position to create mitigation methods in an effort and hard work to limit impacts to the vital route of the undertaking.”

Crew turns to technology on web-site

Clark done a preliminary survey with regular survey devices, these types of as the Leica MS50, which brings together overall station features, GNSS connectivity, digital imaging and 3D laser scanning in a single instrument. The 3D know-how carried out checks of slab edges, precast concrete, joints and ground flatness. The engineering also coordinates present properties to complete tie-ins with the façade.

Just after completing and location survey regulate details about the web site, the group began the scanning and structure process, claimed Kathleen Lavelle, venture supervisor at Clark Design Group.

“For 3D laser scanning, we use our Leica MS50 again which has full scanning abilities. We use our survey control factors to tie the scanning info into web-site coordinates. Immediately after scanning is complete, Leica’s Infinity application is made use of to clean up up the scan,” claimed Lavelle. “This can be exported to diverse file formats relying on the application getting used to operate with the facts.”

The study crew used Leica MultiWorx, an add-on app to Autocad Civil 3D. This scan information can be made use of to create current circumstances and as-built drawings as needed.

Handling an influx of folks

Thanks to its locale adjacent to a university and healthcare middle, the Clark workforce experienced to believe of alternatives to handle the move of college students, patients and site visitors, especially early in the COVID-19 pandemic to account for social distancing rules.

To do this, the design staff crafted a short term pedestrian bridge to preserve accessibility alongside the east side of the jobsite. Furthermore, an on-web site batch plant, manufacturing a lot more than 35,000 cubic yards of concrete, aided with visitors congestion by decreasing the amount of deliveries to the job web page. The plant taken off an believed 3,500 vans off the street as very well as making certain concrete quality on internet site, in accordance to Lavelle.

Getting rid of vehicles from the road also served lower sounds degree, a further obstacle as the building site is in shut proximity to many residential neighborhoods, explained Andree Yaap, challenge govt at Clark Construction Group.

Clark also labored intently with the HKS and proprietor to appraise which venture elements could be made offsite. Working with a official scoring and analysis procedure, the crew chosen features to prefabricate centered on what would offer the most gain to the venture, reported Yaap.

The job features much more than 700 prefabricated materials, which include 156 rest room pods, running room ceilings, individual headwalls, electrical rooms, scientific rooms, MEP skids and racks, and inside partitioning, said Yaap.

Setting up components had been made across the region, with lavatory pods remaining developed in Texas, working area ceilings being developed in Oregon, headwalls currently being designed in Oklahoma and wall panels being constructed in Virginia, stated Yaap.

“Clark’s initiatives have served to expedite schedules and reduce expenses,” said Yaap. “Other positive aspects consist of improved quality resulting from assembly in a managed atmosphere, the reduction of design activity on web-site and a reduction in sounds levels, community website traffic and congestion.”