A new $12 million UF Health Shands Emergency Center will be built near the intersection of Southwest Archer Road and Tower Road, likely by the summer of 2016.
Representatives from UF Health and Alachua County Fire Rescue Services broke ground Wednesday afternoon on a nearly 10,900-square-foot plot of land where the Kanapaha E.R. Center will be built. The facility will be located at 7405 SW Archer Road, said Dr. Joseph Tyndall, the chairman of emergency medicine and the chief of emergency services at UF Health.
The facility will receive patients transported by the fire department and serve as one of two free-standing UF Health E.R. Centers in Gainesville, Tyndall said. The other emergency center is located in Spring Hill near Santa Fe College.
Tyndall said the current emergency room at UF Health Shands has become too full to adequately service the Gainesville community.
"There has been increasing demand for emergency care," he said.
The facility will feature full electronic medical records, up-to-date emergency equipment, 10 examination rooms and a trauma room, Tyndall said.
The UF Health Shands Vice President of Facilities Brad Pollitt said people demand emergency care close to home, which is why UF Health began to draw up plans a little over a year ago for the Kanapaha E.R. Center to be built.
"I think we’ve done a lot to help make Alachua County one of the safest places (and) safest communities around," he said.
