Garage slated for Medical Campus, employee parking shifting east

New interchanges soon will provide additional access

Construction of a 3,000-car employee garage will begin June 1 on the Duncan-Taylor surface lot between the Duncan-Taylor and St. Louis Children’s Hospital employee garages.

Employee parking will begin shifting to the east at Washington University Medical Center as construction continues for the Campus Renewal Project, the School of Medicine’s new research and environmental health/central services buildings and the CORTEX District.

When the new Interstate 64/Highway 40 interchanges at Boyle and Tower Grove avenues open in mid-June, employees also will have a new route to access the east side of the medical center, which will improve traffic flow on Kingshighway for patients and visitors.

“It has been a priority for the School of Medicine and Barnes-Jewish Hospital to separate employee and patient traffic to lessen the congestion on Kingshighway,” said Rick Stanton, associate vice chancellor and associate dean for administration and finance at the School of Medicine. “We both have made a significant investment, along with the Missouri Department of Transportation (MoDOT), to improve employee access to and from the medical center.”

New garage timeline

May 16: Contractors begin to reconfigure first level of Duncan-Taylor garage for The Rehabilitation Institute of St. Louis patients and visitors.
• First level of Duncan-Taylor garage closes to employees
• Garage exit to Duncan Avenue closes
• Pedestrian exit to Duncan remains open
• No changes to other entrances/exits or shuttle stops serving Duncan-Taylor

June 1: Duncan-Taylor lot closes for demolition and construction of employee garage
• SLCH and Duncan-Taylor garages remain open
• Duncan-Taylor entrances/exits from Duncan close
• Taylor exit from Duncan-Taylor garage becomes an entrance/exit and the only entrance/exit to Duncan-Taylor garage
• New employee lot opens at Duncan and Newstead with shuttle service (see map).

August 2015: New garage opens

Construction of a 3,000-car employee garage will begin June 1 as part of the Campus Renewal Project. The garage will be built on the existing Duncan-Taylor surface lot between the Duncan-Taylor and St. Louis Children’s Hospital employee garages (see map) and is expected to open in late summer 2015. School of Medicine employees will occupy 700 spaces in the new garage.

The new garage may enable some medical school faculty and staff to park closer to where they work, said John Ursch, director of protective services at the medical school. “This new garage is going to be large enough that it will allow us to rethink parking and how we can best serve our employees.”

During garage construction, School of Medicine employees in the 4444 Forest Park Ave. building who currently are parking in the Children’s Hospital garage will remain there.

The Campus Renewal team is working closely with BJH and School of Medicine public safety, parking and security to help minimize disruptions and inconveniences.

Some employee parking assignments and shuttle route changes are being finalized. Details will be communicated.

A new surface lot, on the former Clean City Squares lot at 4356 Duncan Ave., also eventually will provide more than 300 new spaces for medical school employees. Barnes-Jewish employees currently parking in the Duncan-Taylor lot will move to the Clean City Squares lot during construction of the new garage. Once Barnes-Jewish employees move into the completed garage, the surface lot will open to medical school employees.

New I-64/Highway 40 interchanges opening in June will include an exit at Tower Grove Avenue to access the campus and a new ramp from Boyle onto westbound I-64/40. Drivers from the east once again will use the Boyle ramp, when it reopens, and the existing ramp off Chouteau Avenue to access eastbound I-64/40.

“These new plans are part of a significant partnership between the School of Medicine, BJC and MoDOT to improve how people get to campus, where they park and how they navigate once they’re on campus,” Stanton said. “We were able to look at the campus as a whole and envision how to refine access to the medical center in coming years.”