Planning issues surround QEII development

Amid a raft of challenges in the health portfolio, one of the few pieces of good news for the state government has been the planned development of a new women’s and babies’ hospital.

Early this month, Health Minister Amber-Jade Sanderson announced the design of the hospital would begin shortly after confirming it would be built just north of Sir Charles Gairdner Hospital.

The $1.8 billion project is one of several major developments earmarked for the Queen Elizabeth II Medical Centre (QEIIMC), which is the largest medical precinct in the Southern Hemisphere.

The 28-hectare site is home to 40 organisations including Perth Children’s Hospital, the Telethon Kids Institute, Harry Perkins Institute of Medical Research, the Lions Eye Institute and the Perron Institute.

The minister said a key factor in choosing the new location for the women’s and babies’ hospital was its advantage in future-proofing the QEIIMC over a 40-year period.

This would include future redevelopment of the newly built Perth Children’s Hospital, the ageing Sir Charles Gairdner Hospital, the PathWest facility and various teaching and research facilities.

Ms Sanderson noted that 480 stakeholders had been consulted so far on development of the new hospital.

One critical aspect about which she was not particularly forthcoming was the chronic issue of access and parking at the QEII precinct.

Any visitor to QEII over the past couple of years knows how difficult it is to get parking during the working day.

Nurses and other staff also battle to find parking.

The new hospital, which is expected to begin construction early next year, will create the need for about 1,000 extra parking bays.

In the meantime, the expected surge in COVID-19 cases in Western Australia as the Omicron variant spreads through the community will bring more people to the precinct for testing and treatment.

Ms Sanderson’s recent statement simply noted that a cross-agency working group would be established to develop options for increased access to car parking at the site, for both the construction and operational phases of the project.

The minister failed to disclose that the Queen Elizabeth II Medical Centre Trust – the independent statutory authority that is landlord for the entire site – has already lodged plans for construction of a major multi-storey car park.

Ms Sanderson also failed to mention the role played by International Parking Group: the private company that owns the existing 3,000-bay multi-storey car park at QEII and operates all major parking facilities across the precinct.

IPG operates under a 26-year public private partnership (PPP) put in place by the Barnett government in 2011.

The PPP was a contentious agreement and has been strongly criticised by Labor.

It was one of about 30 Barnett government projects put under the microscope, after Premier Mark McGowan commissioned former under-treasurer (and current agent general in London) John Langoulant to hold a special inquiry.

The Langoulant report, published in 2018, provided Labor with plenty of ammunition to attack its political opponents.

Commenting on the QEII car park, the report said: “It is questionable whether the project will deliver value for money”.

The original signatory was Capella Capital, which built the $140 million car park after signing up Catholic Super and Lendlease as financial backers.

Capella sold the project in 2019 to IPG, a specialist investment company that owns and operates nine hospital car parks across Australia.

As the McGowan government assesses future parking options, which are not yet budgeted, it needs to abide by the terms of the 2011 contract.

Most notably, if the state procures a competing car park in the QEII precinct – that is, a car park not operated by IPG – this would be assessed as a material adverse event for which IPG may be entitled to compensation.

“The project agreement effectively creates parking management monopoly rights for (IPG) across the precinct,” the Langoulant report concluded.

“These rights include (IPG) having first right of refusal to operate any new car parking facilities on the Queen Elizabeth II Medical Centre site until November 2037.”

Tight squeeze

Sitting between the government and IPG is the QEII Medical Centre Trust, chaired by corporate lawyer Steven Cole.

Mr Cole is grappling with parking and access issues that are easily summarised with a few key statistics.

“The maximum parking for the site, as decreed by WA Planning Commission, is 5,350,” Mr Cole told Business News.

This comprises 4,000 bays for staff, 1,200 for patients and visitors and 150 that are ‘exempt’, mainly for loading and disabled access.

On the other side of the supply-demand equation, the precinct has about 10,000 staff and between 12,000 and 15,000 people go to the precinct daily.

Since the onset of COVID-19, the occupancy of the car parks has neared 100 per cent at peak times.

Mr Cole said that, prior to COVID-19, the patient and visitor car parking was typically at 75-80 per cent occupancy at peak times.

However, that has risen as people travelling to the hospital – like most commuters in Perth – have shied away from public transport.

“As the site develops, a major challenge is site access,” Mr Cole said.

“Parking capacity and management is a part of resolving that change.” Mr Cole also wants a greater focus on improved public transport.

“The original town planning for the precinct, even before construction of the Children’s Hospital, was for a more active public transport solution, with consideration given to a range of options and transport modality solutions such as light rail,” he said.

“That has not happened.”

The only public transport option is buses, but they have low patronage and risk adding to congestion. Up to 75 buses travel through the centre along Hospital Avenue each hour on most days.

An additional bus service (free CAT bus) will start next month.

It will travel from the city, along Kings Park Road and Thomas Street to the QEII precinct and the University of Western Australia: the same route as the light rail service proposed for Perth a decade ago.

Mr Cole would like to see improved public transport services to support the expected growth of the QEII precinct.

He estimates up to $3 billion of building is likely to happen over the next decade, including $1.8 billion on the new women’s and babies’ hospital.

Several other expansion projects are expected, including a prospective expansion of the Children’s Hospital, a new cyclotron facility, a pathology expansion and a comprehensive cancer centre.

Illustrating the expected growth, the QEII Trust’s master plan is designed to accommodate a long-term increase of up to 43 per cent in the lettable floor area.

“That will only be possible if there is improved public access and that needs to include some form of rapid mass public transport,” Mr Cole said.

He added the QEII Trust was concerned to ensure that transport planning for the precinct mitigated the impact on surrounding roads and suburbs.

For instance, Mr Cole said traffic from the site materially added to congestion on Thomas Street in West Perth.

“We also need a solution that does not impact unduly on the local community as well as facilitating easy access for emergency vehicles and others to the site’s hospitals,” he said.

As well as improved public transport, the QEII Trust supports increased parking capacity.

It has got the ball rolling by lodging a development application with the City of Perth for a 1,900-bay, multilevel car park at the south-west corner of the precinct, near the Western Power sub-station on Monash Avenue.

This site currently has about 500 at-grade car bays so the net gain will be about 1,400 bays.

“A facility providing such a level of new car parking is a necessary precursor to accommodating the women’s hospital and other anticipated growth on the site,” Mr Cole said.

The proposed multi-level car park was included in the trust’s most recent master plan, which said the Monash Avenue location would help to ease congestion on Winthrop Avenue.

“With detailed planning, this has the potential to attract traffic away from Winthrop Avenue and the likely future traffic congestion locations,” it stated.

However, Monash Avenue is also a pressure point.

Ramsay Health Care recently built a 530-bay car park at its nearby Hollywood Hospital, also accessed off Monash Avenue.

The QEII Trust’s master plan added that the new multi-level car park would open other parts of the campus for development, most notably the north-east corner currently used for ground-level parking.

Asked about the proposed multi-deck car park, a government spokesperson said the Department of Planning Lands and Heritage had received a development application and was awaiting additional information from the applicant.

“The value of the development application triggers mandatory determination by the City of Perth Local Development Assessment Panel,” the spokesperson said.

The spokesperson asserted the WAPC had not put a cap on the number of parking bays at the QEII precinct but admitted there was a limit.

“There is no cap on the number of parking spaces at the site, however, a previous agreement between the WAPC and the other key stakeholders to limit the number of parking bays will be considered as part of future deliberations,” they said.

The government acknowledged IPG had the inside running to operate the new car park.

“IPG will have the first right to negotiate for the operation of an additional car park,” the spokesperson said.

However, it’s not clear if IPG will build and own the new car park. IPG says it has a proven ability to raise finance for hospital car park projects via long-term equity and debt arrangements.

“IPG’s portfolio of nine sites is testament to an ability to deliver car parking facilities at no cost to the health departments,” the company said.

Against that is the McGowan government’s antipathy to privatised services, evidenced by its scrapping of contracts held by the likes of Serco Australia, Programmed, Suez and Broadspectrum over the past two years.

Labor is also in the process of returning Peel Health Campus – run by Ramsay Health Care – to the public sector.