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New Children's Hospital - A symbol of Ireland's scandalous and shady behavior

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  • Registered Users Posts: 7,359 ✭✭✭MrMusician18


    You are correct. What went wrong here was that the project was tendered before the design was finished. The real question was why did this happen.



  • Registered Users Posts: 82,475 ✭✭✭✭Overheal




  • Registered Users Posts: 7,359 ✭✭✭MrMusician18




  • Registered Users Posts: 19,651 ✭✭✭✭Muahahaha


    iirc the current projected cost is 2.4 billion and that doesnt include the fit out during which tons of very expensive medical equipment will go in. When all is said and done it will likely be over 3 billion if not 3.5bn. That is from an initial budget of 850 million in 2014. I see it now has its own entry on Wikipedias Worlds Most Expensive Buildings page

    And while it will have a helipad Irish coastguard helicopters who provide air ambulance cover will not be able to land there. Instead they will have to land up the road outside the Modern Art museum in Kilmainham and children will then be transferred by road which is a farcical situation. The reason being is the Sikorsky helicopters used by the Irish coastguard are not rated to land on heli pads and they need flat ground to land. There is flat land on the site but the Aer Corps said the landing is too sketchy due to the density of buildings around the site and they advised against Irish coastguard helicopters attempting landings on the available land.

    Now Im no brain surgeon but brain surgeons all say that when it comes to severe brain trauma and bleeding on the brain that time is absolutely critical and that minutes matter in terms of life and death. Yet the non use of the heli pad by the Coastguard will now add on minutes to getting a child into emergency surgery. Think about that is context of spending over 3 billion.

    And you know where they did have space to easily land a Sikorsky Coastguard helicopter? Connolly Hospital with its 50 acres of unused land and which is also geographically closer to more than 75% of the entire Irish population



  • Registered Users Posts: 2,523 ✭✭✭Traumadoc


    Actually they should have built it in Phoenix park on the site of St Mary's hospital, like the new Melbourne Children's Hospital - in a Park ( also the New Alder Hey.)

    The "co-located " with an adult hospital is bull Sh$$ - more about empire building for those hospitals.



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  • Registered Users Posts: 40,006 ✭✭✭✭Boggles


    It includes the equipment apparently for all 3 sites.

    Also I imagine existing equipment will be moved to the site once complete.

    There is 300 million extra ear marked for the transfer and setting up of IT systems, etc.

    I'd love to see the break down of that figure.



  • Registered Users Posts: 296 ✭✭Ham_Sandwich


    what do you want kids out on the street with no hospital?



  • Registered Users Posts: 13,186 ✭✭✭✭jmayo


    This is it in spades.

    Bertie wanted the old boys in his old alma mater, the Mater (pun intended) to get the gig.

    That would have given the Mater great status and of curse was linked to UCD so great bonus for them.

    Of course the An Bord Pleanala scuppered that plan. And a lot of it had to do with skyline rather than total fook up of a site to access.

    And then lo and behold the James site was selected as the perfect site, a large adult hospital linked to Trinity.

    If it was so perfect why wasn't it selected in the first place rather than the cramped site at the Mater not on a Luas line?

    Of course UCD were probably p***d so they of course had to get the new National Maternity hospital.

    Who gave a fook if the trustees were religious and might forbid proper life saving healthcare for pregnant women if the old lad in Rome deemed it so.


    I am surprised the usual suspects haven't been along to tell us how great it is, how we know nothing, how "experts" decided this was best.

    Andy Renko will be along to give the usual spiel about how none of us are experts.

    Some other lad will be telling us most people don't go to a hospital in a car (esepcially a children's hospital) and how lucky it is that the junkie luas line runs alongside of it.

    Ehh they are purchasing a lot of new kit.

    Hell by the time they are live most of the existing kit in other hospitals will be out of date.

    Also some kit can't really be moved such as CTs/MRIs.

    You can't move that stuff overnight.

    Ah don't worry the migrant gravy train has docked for lots of them.

    I am not allowed discuss …



  • Registered Users Posts: 11,774 ✭✭✭✭BattleCorp


    Nobody wants that. I don't think anybody is suggesting pulling it down but it's perfectly valid to question the spending of taxpayer's money and the location of the hospital. In my opinion the Government/HSE fcuked it up in both design, cost and location. It could have been built in a better location for far less money.



  • Registered Users Posts: 40,006 ✭✭✭✭Boggles


    Also some kit can't really be moved such as CTs/MRIs.

    Huh?

    Used machines of that calibre are shipped around the world.



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  • Registered Users Posts: 296 ✭✭Ham_Sandwich


    yeah well someone should have said something at the time then



  • Registered Users Posts: 13,186 ✭✭✭✭jmayo


    Folks for less than this hospital costs so far.

    Australia got the Royal Adelaide Hospital for £1.2bn with 800 beds, all single rooms with ensuites, 40 operating theatres, robotic vehicles to move supplies, heat transfers, water harvesting, a twin elevated helipad capable of taking 11 metric tons.

    And it has more than 1400 car parking spaces.

    Dubai got the Burj Khalfi for £1.38bn, 830 metres high, 163 floors, world highest this that and the other including a helipad.

    Britain got The Shard for £1.38bn the EU's tallest building until Brexit.

    China got the Shanghai Tower for £1.7bn with the world's fastest lift.

    South Korea got the Lotte World Tower for £1.8bn, 123 stories.

    Malaysia got the Petronas Towers for £1.87bn

    USA got the One World Trade Center for £2.8bn


    In 2019 the cost for the New Children's hospital went from €650million to €1.4bn

    That is some fooking miscalculation, some fooking project scope creep right there.

    Now it looks like €1.73bn has been allocated, but estimates are it will be over €2bn

    There will be 7 stories, 600 bed capacity, 380 individual inpatient rooms with ensuite and bed for parent, 22 operating theatres, 1000 car spaces

    The elevated helipad can't take big helicopter like the Coastguard S92s

    So far old Adelaide is much better value me thinks.

    Oh and there will definitely be no fast lifts.

    BTW the HSE said

    ... every construction project, big or small, receives claims and adjustments from the contractor; and this project has been no different. It said the project has “a robust process in place for the assessment of claims and adjustments by the contractor” and has extensive controls to help manage costs.

    Who the fook are these clowns and why are they still in jobs.


    It is times like this I think my idea of us going nuclear would be bad idea as it would probably cost 10 billion and take us 50 years.

    I am not allowed discuss …



  • Registered Users Posts: 16,618 ✭✭✭✭astrofool


    They added speed ramps on the road down to St. Vincents, exactly what you want when dealing with bone breaks and spinal injuries on the way to the hospital...



  • Registered Users Posts: 16,618 ✭✭✭✭astrofool


    I would hesitate to include places like Dubai in lists like this given the cost will be significantly decreased by (effective) slave labour and very lax health and safety laws.



  • Registered Users Posts: 7,359 ✭✭✭MrMusician18


    What a terrible reading of the situation. Connolly has terrible public transport access, and the right place is to have it accessible by means other than car. The majority of patients are not there for emergency healthcare. Connolly is also a university teaching hospital so I don't get your UCD/Trinity thing you are trying to get at. Holles St. Is currently a UCD teaching hospital

    Elm Park site has been leased, not to ensure a religious ethos, but so that the State cannot sell the land and use it for another non-healthcare purpose. The lands to be used would have been used by the hospital itself for its own future expansion. They want to ensure that if they give up.the land, that it remains a healthcare facility to enhance the existing hospital.

    The **** stirring about NMH at Elm park is just that, **** stirring. The opposition is political opportunism mixed with nasty medical politics.



  • Registered Users Posts: 2,012 ✭✭✭eggy81


    I’d be more worried that we’d manage to fcuk it up taking some sort of shortcuts which lead to a disaster of some sort. Port tunnel, national aquatic centre roof. Seems to follow our national projects for some reason.



  • Registered Users Posts: 2,012 ✭✭✭eggy81


    While the cost jump is a problem for me it’s not the biggest issue. The location is wrong and spending that sort of money to not have a hospital that provides many many more beds than already exist plus the helicopter issue and traffic issues and all the rest are more annoying than the cost for me. It’s criminal to not have every single benefit possible for that outlay.



  • Registered Users Posts: 7,359 ✭✭✭MrMusician18


    What's wrong with the Port tunnel? The NAC suffered a local failure in the roof after high winds, years ago and was fixed. I'm not aware of any serious issues out there that are the result of the quality of construction on either project.



  • Registered Users Posts: 2,012 ✭✭✭eggy81


    Nothing now. It leaked at the time it was finished. I know neither are major issues but there was a bit of a hullabaloo about them at the time. The tunnel had to be shut not too long after opening for a while if I recall correctly to fix the issue.



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  • Registered Users Posts: 7,359 ✭✭✭MrMusician18


    Correctly fix the issue at the contractors cost. All building projects have snags to be fixed after completion. All.

    The NCH will be the same. Of course, these issues will be flagged here, by the Independent et. al. as some sort of gotcha - "OMG, €1.7bn and there's a leak in the roof" kind of nonsense.



  • Registered Users Posts: 2,208 ✭✭✭Markus Antonius


    11 million spent on "consultancy" in 2018. I'd love to hear who these consultants are. I wonder if Bertie is one of them?

    TD Catherine Connolly (who I proudly vote for) was spot on:

    "I don't think it's [€1 million spent on PR alone] good value for money. The story of a children's hospital is a story that is sufficient in itself, why you would need to sell it I don't know,"



  • Registered Users Posts: 155 ✭✭I Blame Sheeple


    If a private company using similar contractors to BAM can produce 10 fully equipped and functioning data centres in 3 years, which are probably just as technically advanced to build as a hospital - I really don't see how anyone can think you're a conspiracy theorist for questioning the delays.



  • Registered Users Posts: 5,273 ✭✭✭xxxxxxl


    Well not really in layman's terms Data centres are just giant warehouses with Airconditioning. Add on a UPS High speed connection the the internet. If you Go in one it's just Rack after Rack of servers. Not saying the CH is way over time. You would think at this stage of technology They would be building modular. Room by room slotted together prefabbed. I mean there doing it with ships.



  • Registered Users Posts: 1,781 ✭✭✭mohawk


    Your right most cases aren’t emergencies, however some of those kids are very, very sick and will not be brought there by public transport if it can be avoided especially in winter. Think your chemo patients and kids being tube fed, tracheostomy’s etc. Most kids won’t be brought home by Luas following a surgery either.

    Outpatient check ups etc public transport is important, but again remember some of the kids referred up are from every corner of the country. I know I would do a 3 hour drive to Dublin over a 5 hour journey to get there by bus. For anything significant with children you are referred to Dublin.

    So car access and public transport access were important to consider



  • Registered Users Posts: 2,818 ✭✭✭Northernlily


    Absolutely tragic location. Beyond belief that was chosen and seeing what is still been spent on it.

    Kilmainham is an absolute bottleneck. The lights could change 3/4 times there some days before you get through. God help parents or ambulances rushing sick children in there.

    We do things absolutely stupid in this country sometimes. I hate reading about and the sight of this hospital because it's infuriating.

    We'd have built 8 stadiums and hosted the world cup for the same price as this Gombeen Civil Service led botch job which will ultimately be a shitshow.



  • Registered Users Posts: 2,100 ✭✭✭Mr. teddywinkles


    The piper will always have to be paid when the music stops. People dont realise the music just hasn't stopped yet.



  • Registered Users Posts: 2,100 ✭✭✭Mr. teddywinkles


    Kevin Costner was one of them. I think they called them the untouchables.



  • Registered Users Posts: 1,609 ✭✭✭thinkabouit


    An unbelievable waste of money, for that kinda money it should never need another cent spent on it for over a hundred year’s.



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  • Moderators, Sports Moderators Posts: 26,753 Mod ✭✭✭✭Podge_irl


    For those just blithely throwing out commentary about "co-locating being bullshit" I would be very curious as to their reasoning behind this and why in fact they are correct when various expert reports viewed it very differently. Why is having access to more specialties not important? Why is having joint care between the children and adult hospital for adolescents not important? Why is having the critical mass of expertise and staffing that a teaching hospital brings not important?

    The cost overrun does seem to be indicative of a poorly run tendering process for sure so there are valid criticisms available. The location just isn't one of them.



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