After gaining widespread philanthropic, civic, and community support that enabled the development of the 60-acre Mission Bay campus, there is broad consensus within the UCSF community to now focus on Parnassus Heights. Half of the buildings at Parnassus Heights are at least 50 years old, and a lack of investment in the Parnassus Heights campus has led to the deterioration of the physical infrastructure and concern among the faculty regarding their ability to optimally carry out their work, let alone recruitment and retention. The improvement of the Parnassus Heights campus site, including the new adult hospital, also presents a great opportunity to enhance this campus for the community in adjacent neighborhoods.

The CPHP will be a comprehensive physical plan for the Parnassus Heights campus, based on the University’s short and long-term strategic objectives, that helps us sustain our mission of conducting top-tier research, clinical care, and education at Parnassus Heights. The CPHP will contain master plan-level guidance for the overall physical environment at Parnassus Heights. It will focus on the configuration of buildings and open space areas and the major types of uses within buildings (e.g., inpatient, outpatient, research, instruction, support, housing, and parking), with special attention paid to the adjacency of uses especially at the intersection of clinical, research, and instruction uses. The CPHP will not contain specific architectural designs for individual buildings or projects, as those details will be defined in separate implementation projects that will follow the CPHP.

Planning for the Parnassus Heights campus site is being coordinated with planning for new clinical facilities and the hospital. UCSF Health leadership is represented on the Parnassus Master Plan Steering Committee and in working groups. We aim to ensure integration of our research, clinical and education missions with this process.

UCSF’s Long Range Development Plan (LRDP) is a planning document that guides future campus growth and physical development through the year 2035. The LRDP covers all of UCSF’s campus sites. The LRDP’s preparation is required by the University of California Board of Regents, the latest of which was approved in 2014. The Regents must also approve any substantive changes to the 2014 LRDP.

In contrast, the CPHP is a campus-level planning document focused specifically on the Parnassus Heights campus site. It will take a deep look at current site planning and facilities challenges, and recommend an overall future vision for the site that will ultimately be confirmed by campus leadership, with the advice of the Parnassus Master Plan Steering Committee. If there are major land use conflicts between the LRDP and the CPHP, the LRDP will be amended to reconcile any substantive discrepancies, following appropriate environmental review under the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA).

UCSF is committed to improving how the campus interacts and connects with the surrounding Parnassus Heights neighborhood. Information about the community engagement process is available on community.ucsf.edu.

A neighborhood survey was conducted in August 2018 for general community feedback, and we have hosted two community open houses to engage our neighbors about the process and hear their feedback directly. A third open house is planned for June 12, 2019. In addition, we share information about the project and meeting dates on our email listserv. To join the listserv, please email [email protected].

A Parnassus Heights Community Working Group has been convened to (1) advise UCSF staff on neighborhood issues and opportunities related to the re-envisioning process, (2) articulate key community planning and design principles to be considered by UCSF as it considers future projects, (3) identify recommended strategies and actions for addressing community concerns regarding the physical development of the campus, (4) provide input and feedback to UCSF staff for the purpose of helping UCSF be a good neighbor to the community at-large, and (5) serve as a communication link between UCSF and the community.

Working group members include representatives of the UCSF Community Advisory Group (CAG), Inner Sunset and Cole Valley residents and merchants, representatives from city agencies and local non-profits and UCSF staff. Working group meetings will continue through May 2019 and are open to the public.

Yes. With recommendations from the deans and other leadership on faculty and staff participation, the Parnassus Master Plan Steering Committee, co-chaired by EVCP Dan Lowenstein and Senior Vice Chancellor Paul Jenny, was convened to oversee the preparation of the CPHP. The steering committee includes representatives with diverse perspectives from all four professional schools, the Graduate Division, Academic Senate, UCSF Health, UCSF Real Estate, and University Relations, among others. Working Groups with more participants have also been formed to look more closely at space for a Central Research Lab, research space more generally, educational space, and space for digital health/informatics. Our expectation is that these representatives communicate back with their groups and peers and also field/share questions from their peers. In addition, in September 2018, UCSF released a survey to all UCSF employees for feedback and received over 1,800 responses and a research faculty survey focused on the programmatic needs of the research community garnered approximately 1,200 responses. Both of these surveys provided valuable input to the plan.

The CoLabs are a key component within the comprehensive Parnassus plan and design. The CoLabs are now under development to provide critical resources to the research community and to serve as a catalyst to further Parnassus Heights planning efforts. This project will house combinations of critical personnel and matched cutting-edge methods and technologies to enable innovative life science research of the very highest quality, and promote collaboration in research across a wide range of disciplines. The facility is envisioned to be contiguous space, with partitioned sections for integrated core functions, including specimen processing, cell separation/sorting, imaging, genomic analysis, and other functions. It is intended to serve as many types of stakeholders as possible, enabling multidisciplinary science and collaboration, and contribute to optimal research productivity.

UCSF leadership is committed to enhancing Parnassus Heights. The plan will identify a series of phased improvements for progressive investment over time and we are working with cost estimators to get some high-level insights into the projected cost for some of the potential near-term projects.

The CPHP planning process is closely integrated with the Budget office’s planning for the 10-Year Core Financial Plan and analysis is underway to better understand the campus’s capacity to undertake significant new projects in a realistic and sustainable way.

Given the scope of the improvements we hope to achieve, we anticipate that philanthropy must play a significant role.  University Development and Alumni Relations (UDAR) is strategizing on the fundraising potential for projects proposed in the Comprehensive Parnassus Heights Plan and are optimistic that there is significant opportunity for cultivating donor interest. As the CPHP is finalized and leadership direction on sequencing is clarified, UDAR will continue to coordinate with the UCSF Real Estate team to identify donor opportunities and match programs and projects to our philanthropic supporters.

The current timeline is to have a draft plan to review and get feedback from the steering committee, stakeholders, and the community by May 2019. A final plan with preliminary cost estimates is expected to be completed by June 2019.

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Given the complexity of the existing campus, the topography, the design and approvals processes, and the lack of an “empty chair” for temporary moves to accommodate major project activity, it is challenging to do renovations and new construction at Parnassus Heights. There is a study underway to better understand these challenges and more information should be available soon.

Leadership recognizes that the enhancement of the research environment at Parnassus Heights is absolutely critical to the future of UCSF, both in terms of the commitment to being a world-class life sciences university, as well as the many benefits that cutting-edge research brings to our clinical and education missions. It is worth noting that, from the very start, one of the main drivers for the entire Parnassus Heights re-envisioning process was bringing clarity to the need for major investments in the research enterprise. Now, after more than 3 years of study, we are closing in on a plan that will meet our goal of re-establishing Parnassus Heights as a premier research campus. At this point, there are a number of options for moving ahead with creating new or renovated research facilities, including the establishment of CoLabs. However, we are still in the midst of the complex analyses needed to determine when and where these projects can move forward. Our hope is that the substantive planning that has occurred over the past 3 years, and the clear understanding by leadership of the importance of revitalizing the Parnassus Heights research environment, will allow our current faculty, and those we wish to attract here, to see a very bright future.

The space ceiling was imposed on UCSF by the UC Regents in 1976. It limits development at the Parnassus Heights campus to 3.5 million gross square feet of enclosed space, which includes the parking garages and all buildings except housing. UCSF has been working closely with our neighborhood community, as well as representatives from the City and County, during the Parnassus re-envisioning process. This collaboration will continue as we work to understand how the new plan for Parnassus translates into actual square footage. 

We are working with key leadership at Mount Zion to incorporate their perspectives and develop a similar vision for Mount Zion, aligned with the CPHP.

People, Progress, Parnassus is a communications campaign focused on providing information about physical improvements being made currently on the Parnassus Heights campus. Projects highlighted include bathroom renovations; elevator modernization; landscape improvements; installation of solar panels; new security cameras; additional vehicle charging stations in the parking garage; and interior painting. Quarterly email updates are sent to the Parnassus Heights community and any others interested; to join the email list please send a request to [email protected]

Investment in our future is critical to the existence and continued growth of UCSF Health. The healthcare landscape is incredibly competitive for providers, staff and patients. To create more access for patients, and advance the research and education mission, we have to think well into the future and plan accordingly. Moffitt Hospital needs to be replaced and/or renovated in order for us to meet legislated seismic deadlines of 2030 of which we are required to comply. Equally as important, however, is that investing in our facilities is a way of investing in our patients, providers, and staff by creating a more inviting, functional, and state of art building in which to provide care.

These funds will support the planning, design, and construction of a new, world-class hospital at Parnassus Heights, ensuring that UCSF can continue to provide premier care to patients in the San Francisco Bay Area and beyond in the 21st century. The total cost of the new hospital is not known at this time, but it is assumed that additional funds will need to be identified and procured to complete the construction of the hospital that is estimated to exceed $2 billion.

Building a new hospital takes quite a long time. The necessary planning steps have already begun. The preliminary timeline calls for construction to begin in the second half of 2023. Prior to that, the focus of the work will be on programming, master planning, and designing.

Long Hospital will connect to the new hospital, which will be built on the current site of Langley Porter Psychiatric Institute (LPPI). The existing Moffitt building must be decommissioned for inpatient care OR seismically retrofit by 2030. The master planning and program efforts that will take place from 2019-2020 will not only determine what will be placed in the new hospital, but will also plan for the future of both the Long and Moffitt buildings.

Similar to the funding for Mission Bay, we plan to fund this through a combination of debt and philanthropy and will be as efficient as possible in our design and construction while maintaining the excellence of care for which we are known. We are deeply appreciative of a generous commitment from the Helen Diller Foundation, which has provided us a wonderful start.

UCSF Health does not receive any funding for capital projects from the State of California.

The new hospital will be constructed on the site of the current Langley Porter Psychiatric Hospital and Clinics. Once LPPI’s services, patients, and providers have been relocated, the building will be demolished in order for the new hospital to be built.
 

The LPPI outpatient clinics will relocate to 2130 3^rd St. in 2020 once construction is completed. The inpatient and partial hospitalization programs will be relocated to an alternative space. Discussions are actively underway to identify an appropriate location for the relocation of these services, but no final decision has been made yet.

Given the advances in transportation technology as well as the current traffic and parking congestion, there is no plan to expand parking for the new hospital. The planning processes include traffic modeling and impact analysis to ensure that adequate patient access and pick-up/drop-off accommodations are provided.

This will be identified during the programming and design phases of the project which span the next four years. That process will define what goes in the new hospital building, as well as what will go into the remaining hospital buildings.

Yes, the buildings will be connected. However, building codes and regulations have changed since Long Hospital was built in the 1980’s, which means that room size and ceiling heights in the two buildings will differ. The hospitals will be connected, but only at certain levels as yet to be determined by the architect and builders.