Building begins at Barts and The Royal London Hospitals

An artist's impression of how the atrium at The Royal London will look in the new hospital

The £1bn scheme to redevelop Barts Hospital in Smithfield and The Royal London Hospital in Whitechapel is now underway.

Over 180 construction workers are on both sites where they have started work on transforming these two historic hospitals.

Barts Hospital, which first opened in 1123, will become a Cancer and Cardiac Centre of Excellence. Most clinical services will be based in a new eight-storey, state-of-the-art facility. The new Cancer Centre is due to be open in 2010 with the Cardiac Centre set to be operational in 2016. Most of the clinical services currently provided at The London Chest Hospital in Bethnal Green will move to Barts when construction is complete.

The Royal London Hospital, which dates back to 1740 and has been on the Whitechapel site since 1757, will be largely rebuilt. Most clinical services, including London’s leading trauma and emergency care centre, the capital’s second largest children’s hospital and one of Europe’s largest renal units, will be housed in a new landmark 18-storey building expected to be complete in 2012 in time for the Olympic Games. London’s Air Ambulance, which is based at the hospital, will operate from the top of the new building. Other elements of the hospital are due to be finished in 2016.

Artist's impression of the historic square at Barts, restored to its former glory as a pedestrian piazza

The new hospitals will have up to 1,248 patient beds. Of these, 40 per cent will be in single, en-suite rooms with the remainder in roomy four-bed bays. There will be eight state-of-the-art operating theatres at Barts and another 22 theatres at The Royal London. The new hospitals will have the latest medical equipment, with Siemens contracted to provide the most up-to-date diagnostic and treatment technology until 2045. The redevelopment will also see a new civic square created behind the existing front block of The Royal London Hospital while the main square at Barts will be restored to its former glory as a pedestrian piazza.

Capital Hospitals, a company recently formed by the Trust’s private sector partners Skanska, Innisfree and Equion (part of John Laing plc), will manage the construction and running of the new buildings over the next 42 years. The existing hospitals will be fully operational during construction. Protective screens have been erected around construction areas to reduce the impact of building work on patients.

Paul White, Chief Executive of Barts and The London NHS Trust, said: "This is the biggest hospital redevelopment programme in Britain. It will transform Barts and The Royal London. Our hospitals have a long and proud tradition of providing first class care to patients not only from London but from across Britain. We have some of the best clinical results in the country. This redevelopment scheme not only guarantees the future of these historic hospitals but also ensures that our excellent clinical results will soon be matched by facilities to rival the very best in Europe."

John Ashworth, Chairman of Barts and The London NHS Trust, said: "I am immensely proud that we have now finally started building our new hospitals. It has been a long journey. It has been a sometimes rocky journey. But we are now firmly on our way. Of course, none of this would have been possible without the tremendous effort and support of many individuals and organisations, including our patients, our staff, our private sector partners and the St Bartholomew’s and The Royal London Charitable Foundation. I would also like to take this opportunity to thank our colleagues elsewhere in the NHS, the local community and Merrill Lynch, the financial management company and our neighbours at Barts, for their assistance in helping us to reach this crucial milestone."

Barts and The London NHS Trust has been working on plans to redevelop Barts and The Royal London since 1998. Skanska Innisfree, a private consortium, was appointed preferred bidder for the scheme in 2003. Planning permission for Barts was granted in 2004 and for The Royal London in 2005. The Department of Health and HM Treasury approved the scheme in March 2006, enabling the Trust and Skanska Innisfree to achieve financial close at the end of April.