Construction officially begins on new South Niagara hospital

Officials broke ground at the construction site of the new $3.6 billion South Niagara hospital. The eight-story facility is scheduled to start taking patients in about five years and will have 469 patient beds.

Officials say the Niagara region has been fighting for this hospital for more than ten years. Niagara Health says the hospital will transform local health care.

Niagara Falls mayor Jim Diodati said, “This is the biggest provincial capital expenditure in the Niagara region’s history and we are so grateful. It’s been a long time coming.”

A new hospital in five years still leaves people in Fort Erie and Port Colborne without an urgent care centre in their community at night. The urgent care centres in the two communities close down between 10 p.m. and 10 a.m.

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Local officials say they don’t want to wait for a new hospital in five years to have urgent care close by, especially in a region where winter storms can shut down transportation.

Fort Erie mayor Wayne Redekopp said, “We’re working on getting those hours back and trying to make sure that we will have the urgent care, primary care, diagnostics, and clinics in Fort Erie still for our residents.”

Niagara Falls NDP MPP Wayne Gates said, “We need our urgent care centre open in Fort Erie for the next four, five, six years. You can’t have 34,000 going up to 40,000 in Fort Erie without 24-hour urgent care.”

Niagara Health wasn’t available to comment on the issue today.

Premier Doug Ford says the hospital construction is also going to create jobs. MPP Wayne Gates says those jobs should go to the region, “I’m saying use local workers, local tradespeople, local businesses, local engineers. That’s what we need to do with this facility.”

The hospital is due to open in 2028.

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