Denver developer RMS Properties has begun construction of a second medical office building on the campus of the fast-growing St. Francis Medical Center in northeast Colorado Springs.
The 58,000-square-foot building, called Woodmen Medical Plaza, will be leased to primary care and other medical practices that seek locations near the hospital; the $25 million project is scheduled to open in June. Tenants have signed letters of intent for about one fourth of the space in the four-story building.
RMS Properties principal Randy Schwartz said demand is strong for medical office buildings in Colorado Springs as hospital construction continues to boom.
“We are building this project without tenant commitments because there is good demand for medical offices in Colorado Springs,” said Schwartz, who was involved in developing another medical office building on the campus of Penrose Hospital in 2012 before forming his own company. “A lot of medical practices want to build their own offices until they understand the cost of doing that. We give them the opportunity to own part of the building without having to be involved in development.”
It’s just a part of growth at St. Francis. Penrose-St. Francis Health Services is in the middle of a $77 million project to build out 60 patient beds, including 30 for intensive care patients, in unfinished space on the fifth and six floors of an expansion at St. Francis that opened last year. The latest expansion is scheduled for completion in June and will make St. Francis the largest hospital in the Centura Health system, parent company of Penrose-St. Francis, at 339 beds.
The Boldt Co., a Wisconsin based construction and development company, meanwhile, opened the 75,00-square-foot St. Francis Pavilion on the St. Francis campus in June to house endoscopy services, an imaging lab, gastroenterology, otolaryngology, allergy/immunology and a cancer center. Boldt added the cancer center to the project after construction began and completed that part of the project in August; it includes breast care, women’s imaging, radiation oncology and gynecologic oncology services.
Centura last month broke ground on the Woody and Millie Ingram Guest House near the St. Francis Cancer Center to house the families of patients undergoing cancer treatment, babies in the neonatal intensive care unit and others. The 29,000-square-foot complex is scheduled to open in June 2023 and is supported by the Penrose-St. Francis Health Foundation’s Guest House Ministry and HBA Cares, the philanthropic arm of the Housing & Building Association of Colorado Springs.
Another medical office building on the St. Francis Medical Center campus, NorthCare, opened when the hospital was completed in 2008.
Centura began construction of a third major hospital campus in Colorado Springs in May near Interstate 25 and InterQuest Parkway. The $160 million St. Clare Hospital is scheduled to open in spring 2023 and will focus on orthopedic and spine care to serve the fast-growing neighborhoods of northern Colorado Springs and northern El Paso County. That campus also is expected to include a separate medical office building.
RMS is a partner in the building under construction with Colorado Springs commercial real estate agent and investor Gary Hollenbeck. Grant Seanor and Dave Schroeder II of Colorado Springs Commercial, a Cushman & Wakefield affiliate, are handling leasing for the building.
This content was originally published here.