GALLERY | Construction of £105m Manchester mental health hospital completes
North View, a 150-bedroom in-patient mental health unit, will open its doors next month after works were finalised this week.
The purpose-built project has been constructed by contractor IHP, a joint venture between VINCI Building and Sir Robert McAlpine.
The project’s designer, Gilling Dod Architects, hailed the development as “the single biggest investment in mental health services in Greater Manchester for a generation” in a press release.
On Friday, the £105m building was formally handed over to the Greater Manchester Mental Health NHS Foundation Trust, which will operate the site.
- View a gallery of the site below
The hospital will provide nine single-sex wards, six wards for adults of working age, a psychiatric intensive care unit, a rehabilitation ward, and an older adult ward.
North View will replace Park House, an inpatient ward at North Manchester General Hospital in Crumpsall. It will provide a gross internal floorspace of 132,000 sq ft.
The application was approved in January 2021, and demolition works on the site to prepare for works began in September 2022.
Marc Reed, the GMMH trust’s project director, said: “This is the culmination of significant investment and several years of hard work by various stakeholders and partners to reach this point.
“We are really looking forward to the building becoming fully operational, which will create new therapeutic environments to support the recovery of our service users, and provide optimum conditions for our staff to deliver the highest quality of care.”
The site has been built with consideration for the latest environmental standards, including the net zero commitment for modern mental health environments.
Gary Hughes, IHP and VINCI’s North West regional director, said: “We believe that the trust’s ambition to maximise the use of renewable energy, innovative technology, and sustainable materials has now been realised through North View.
“It will play a key part in reducing GMMH’s reliance on fossil fuels, while supporting deliver towards a net zero National Health Service.”
Garry Bowker, regional managing director for the North at VINCI, added: “We are delighted to have been involved in delivering North View, which has visibly transformed the working environment for Greater Manchester Mental Health Trust staff, towards improving patient treatment and care.
“Construction of North View also enabled us to create significant employment, training and education opportunities, while enabling us to invest in an on-site community skills centre to support local 16-24-year-olds furthest away from the labour market.
He added: “This has helped to close the construction skills gap in North Manchester.”
The North View scheme is part of the wider New Hospital Programme, which seeks to redevelop the 67-acre North Manchester General Hospital site.
Those that worked on the project include, WSP, Redmore, DAY Project Management, Watermans, Rider Hunt, Ramboll, Turleys, Curtins, and Iteriad.
The original planning application can be viewed on Manchester City Council’s planning portal using the reference 128563/FO/2020.
Click any image to launch gallery. All images by Christian Smith Photography and provided by Greater Manchester Mental Health Foundation Trust
It was fantastic to be able to lead the Project team to handover on this life changing scheme!
By DAY Project Management
Do the architects count prisons as one of their specialisms?
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It looks like a prison modelled on a jigsaw puzzle
By Duncan Smith