CHICAGO | Rush University Medical Center | 14 FLOORS | COM - Page 11

the urban politician · #**201** Posted **Oct 5, 2010, 5:57 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by J_M_Tungsten

Now this is pretty cool, its like Wall-e! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dTIwys_aiCE

^ I was fully expecting Buck Rogers to jump out into the scene.

Seriously, though, we all focus a lot on just the building itself but by building a massive new state of the art hospital, Rush is really making a major statement of its arrival among the big shots of academic health care. The question is how much this may/will raise Rush's rankings.

The other question is, of course, that by not "keeping up with the Joneses" as UIC had planned, and by not building a new facility, how much has UIC (and the State of Illinois) shot themselves in the foot? Rush, NW, and U of C have all been constructing major new state of the art hospitals (even Cook County built a new hospital roughly 7-8 years ago), and it is my understanding that Loyola plans to do the same in Maywood in the near future, and even Mt Sinai on the SW side has plans brewing. Add to that other hospital expansions in the suburbs, and one has to ask what the fate of UIC will be in this cutthroat environment. Lets not forget that all of these hospitals are competing for insured patients, which are of limited supply especially in this economy.

Ch.G, Ch.G · #**202** Posted **Oct 5, 2010, 6:01 PM**

Yeah, that's awesome. It reminds me of the transportation network they're setting up for Norman Foster's little desert city. I love technology.

the urban politician · #**203** Posted **Oct 5, 2010, 6:05 PM**

One of the big investments Rush made to procure its economic future is that huge, modern Orthopedics facility just next door.

In modern medicine, Ortho is the big money-maker for most hospitals, and that will likely be the case for quite some time. Orthopedic procedures bring in millions of dollars per year to a given hospital, and most of these are elective procedures for insured patients. The stuff I do for a living (saving lives, treating illness) is the true function of a hospital, but ultimately it generates relatively little income because a lot of those people are uninsured, Medicaid, etc etc.

spyguy · #**204** Posted **Oct 5, 2010, 10:06 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by the urban politician

The other question is, of course, that by not "keeping up with the Joneses" as UIC had planned, and by not building a new facility, how much has UIC (and the State of Illinois) shot themselves in the foot?

It certainly doesn't help them compete. But what can they really do in the short run given the state's fiscal problems? Hopefully things improve and they proceed with most of their plans.

And given what you said about ortho, UIC Medical might be OK since I believe that's housed in a new glassy building that spans Taylor.

JM, anyone - assuming Rush demolishes their older buildings (

), what are they planning to do with all of that land? Hopefully it won't be as boring as Stroger expanding their parking garage into part of the old Cook County Hospital parcel.

Nowhereman1280 · #**205** Posted **Oct 6, 2010, 5:50 AM**

I love supply chain robots. If you really want to be impressed you should see a modern warehouse. For example, the Georgia Pacific warehouses are fully automated. My friend sells such robots and its amazing to see a massive 300k sqft warehouse full of paper products just teaming with robots sorting, organizing, and loading trucks with product. Apparently its common for factory workers to break the robots because their jobs are being displaced by them. My friend says they get several robots a month that have been involved in "accidents" that the robot would never have got itself in that have been clearly been inflicted by a human. Apparently the workers really fear their gradual replacement by machines. The war has already begun!

Alliance · #**206** Posted **Oct 6, 2010, 6:04 AM**

Does anyone have a shot of the northeast side of this building? Someone needs a reference for a diagram. In all the renders and phots I've seen its blocked by the pedestrian bridges.

J_M_Tungsten · #**207** Posted **Oct 6, 2010, 2:19 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by spyguy

JM, anyone - assuming Rush demolishes their older buildings (

), what are they planning to do with all of that land? Hopefully it won't be as boring as Stroger expanding their parking garage into part of the old Cook County Hospital parcel.

It is going to be turned in to a park as of right now. Yippeeeeee...

J_M_Tungsten · #**208** Posted **Oct 6, 2010, 4:39 PM**

10-6
So one thing I noticed is that there are a lot of dents and dings in the new siding. Is this to be expected? Is it covered by the construction company? Will they most likely fix it? I know I would be pretty pissed if my almost billion dollar building wasn't perfect!