Central DuPage Hospital unveils parking deck plans

Central DuPage Hospital officials presented plans Wednesday to the Winfield plan commission on a new $7.4 million parking deck at the hospital campus.

The project is part of a planned multimillion-dollar expansion at Central DuPage's sprawling campus that includes a new hospital wing with 202 private rooms and a proton cancer therapy center.

The state's health facilities planning board approved the proposed new bed tower in October, and hospital officials plan on seeking state approval for the proton center early next year.

The five-story, $257 million patient wing, in particular, would be built on parts of the hospital's parking lot. Central DuPage plans to offset the lost spaces by building the two-story deck.

The roughly 150-yard-long structure would be located along the eastern edge of Winfield Road, just north of Highlake Road.

The deck would accommodate 360 parking spaces. At that size, the cost of the deck would be roughly $18,000 per parking spot.

Larry Bell, the hospital's director of construction, assured plan commission members the new parking deck would be built with an eye toward aesthetics.

"Our philosophy is to make a nice, inviting entrance for patients," Bell said.

Central DuPage officials had pulled a plan to temporarily move the hospital's helicopter pad to the west side of Winfield Road to make room for the 202-room patient wing.

The helicopter site would have been located on the property of the former Frank's Family Foods grocery store, which the hospital bought in January 2002. Instead, the property will now be used as parking for hospital staff.

The former grocery store property also is part of a roughly 19-acre area village officials are eyeing as a potential redevelopment site for its tiny downtown.

Plan commission members deferred their vote on the parking deck project until their meeting next month.