By Kirk Ross
Staff Writer
CHAPEL HILL — Plans for a major new UNC medical center across from the Durham Tech campus in Hillsborough are moving forward now that an agreement has been reached between UNC and Alamance Regional Medical Center.
Alamance Regional officials had appealed the approval of UNC’s application for a Certificate of Need from the state, which put a halt to planning and development for the 83-acre site in the Waterstone development near the intersection of Old N.C. 86 and I-40.
Gary Park, president of UNC Hospitals, said last week that the appeal had been dropped.
UNC plans to build a new medical campus on the site, including a hospital with a Level II emergency department, 68 licensed beds, 15 observation beds and six operating rooms. Construction on outpatient facilities is expected to start within a year. The health care system’s goal is to open the new hospital in 2015. A more detailed timeline for the project is expected to be announced soon.
UNC announced in early 2009 that it had shifted its expansion plans to the Hillsborough site because of the costs and complications of adding a large number of beds to its Manning Drive facilities.