LIMITED LAND MASTER PLANNING

Maximizing Program in Limited Space

When St. Mary’s Hospital, Athens, Georgia embarked on the largest capital facilities expansion in their history, they needed the confidence they could do so without preempting future growth alternatives. St. Mary’s had limited land on which to expand and MMA developed a plan that allowed them to ultimately replace their entire acute campus component with only 10% additional land. The history of hospital expansion speaks for itself. Just when you think you have enough land, you don’t. MMA treats all master planning exercises as an urban high density land planning challenge. This does not mean that non institutional healing environments, greenspace and clear wayfinding are sacrificed. MMA is expert at showing a client how their campus can achieve a maximum density configuration in an intelligible, attractive way.

The positioning of Medical Office Buildings on a hospital campus has significant master planning implications. St. Mary’s new 80,000 sq. ft. MOB and parking deck design was originally devised by the developer’s non-medical architect. MMA protected St. Mary’s long range growth interests with a different design that even the developer acknowledged was a better design. MMA became part of the design team as a result.