Inspira Health Woodbury and Deptford Construction Updates
Inspira Health is making good progress on two Gloucester County projects in Woodbury and Deptford.
At Woodbury, steel is being used for a new building to house an emergency room and in-patient behavioral health department, while at Deptford, a new medical office center is being developed in the former Dick’s Sporting Goods building…whose front facade has been removed.
(Dick’s Sporting Goods moved to Deptford Mall across the street in August 2020.)
A third very large project is yet to come… what to do with their main building/property in Woodbury after the main use of the hospital has been moved to a new facility in Mullica Hill. Back in December, I shared that Inspira had hired a company to look at options for the building and land.
Inspira Woodbury: Emergency department and inpatient behavioral health
I last reported on the plans for Woodbury on December 1st where I shared an outline of what was being developed at Woodbury.
The current construction activity is concentrated on the property next to the core building, which used to house an entire hospital.
As a brief background on the need for the new building, the hospital’s core functions, which were handled at Woodbury, were previously moved to a new hospital at Mullica Hill.
That being said, the Emergency Department and Behavioral Health Units remain in Woodbury, and currently still exist in the old former hospital building.
Therefore the plan is to develop a completely new, separate building for these two important entities, which would fully free up the former hospital building and site for future developments (to be determined).
Woodbury new build
On this lot next to the former hospital, Inspira demolished buildings last fall before building a new emergency room and behavioral health inpatient building.
Upon completion, the new two-story building will house a 24,900-square-foot emergency room on the first floor and a 21,500-square-foot, 20-bed behavioral health facility on the second floor.
A second smaller one-story building of approximately 5,400 square feet is also planned for the property and will be used as an ambulance and shipping garage.
A significant portion of the steel structure is available for the 24,900 sf main building. It is an elongated lot and the new development is closer to Broad Street.
It appears that what is already in place includes the canopy of the ER entrance as well as the corner of the building that will be a two-story glass entrance atrium.
I’m not a building expert but it seems there are two types of steel in the frame construction… inner structural steel that comes out of the elements (brownish) and then galvanized steel profiles that are part of the outer glass wall and entrance canopy as they are more were exposed to moisture.
The positioning of the building and the ER entrance places it across the street from (and in close proximity to) the existing ER area that everyone has known for decades.
Once the new building opens, emergency vehicles and patients would take the same turn off Broad Street but turn right into the new ER instead of left into the old one as they are doing now!
I don’t have a completion date for this new building, but it’s clear that Inspira and their contractors are moving the project forward quickly.
Inspira Health Center Deptford
Back in October 2021, 42Freeway informed readers of Inspira’s plans to build a new doctor’s office in Deptford and repurpose the building that last housed Dick’s Sporting Goods property.
Approved in Spring 2022, this project is a smart reuse of the large building. However, it will still require significant construction efforts to convert it into the medical facility.
The placement across from Deptford Mall likely aims to take advantage of well-developed access roads, placing the medical facility near a large patient base.
With plenty of shopping and dining nearby, the medical facility and area businesses will likely benefit each other.
One aspect of the Deptford project is to convert the front facade into a predominantly glass front wall.
If you’re just driving through the mall today, you’ve probably noticed that the front wall segment has been removed.
With a lot of construction going on inside the building, it’s likely that we won’t see the new glass facade until later in the development project.
A canopy roof entrance is also planned for the front.
The building is being developed as multiple medical offices and will include practices such as urology, orthopedics, imaging, cardio, general medical offices and more.
There will be no patient beds or an emergency room at the Deptford facility.
In our 2022 article, we noted that the building was developed as the Best Product Showroom Store circa 1980 and later became Dick’s Sporting Goods.
While many will note that Dick’s Sporting Goods was a single-story interior, there was actually a mezzanine section on the second floor, originally developed by retailer Best Products as a storage area.
The planning committee commented that their goal was to complete the entire shell and move into the ground floor. At a later date they would focus on the second floor.
Our previous report indicated that the first floor is expected to open in late 2023 (or first quarter of 2024) and the second floor is expected to open 2 years later
Links and Locations
Inspira Health Woodbury campus
509 N Broad St (and surrounding blocks)
Woodbury NJ
Inspira Health in Deptford
399 Almonesson Rd
Deptford NJ
company website