$2-billion acute care hospital in Windsor-Essex expected to cost more

The $2-billion acute care hospital in Windsor is now expected to cost more due to inflation.

“It's unfortunate. Arguably, we should be cutting the ribbon right now and we're not,” says Windsor Regional Hospital president and CEO David Musyj.

The rezoning application was originally approved five years ago, but due to appeals over the location by the group CAMPP, the Citizens for an Accountable Mega Hospital planning process – the project was put on hold.

CAMPP lost the final court decision in May of 2021.

Musyj says plans for phase 1.3 (formerly stage 2) will be submitted to the ministry of health this month and the hope is to get a shovel in the ground in 2026.

The acute care hospital is expected to open in 2030 as further delay will likely increase construction costs.

"The goal here is to hopefully get non-residential construction costs at a 3 per cent growth rate - which was prior to COVID, which is where it was sitting,” says Musyj. “It's not there now. It's 7 -8 per cent per year and as I stated as Statistic Canada stated - for the first quarter of 2022 it was 13 per cent for non-residential."