The Sanders Trust | Valley Springs Behavioral Health Hospital | Holyoke, MA

Located in Holyoke, MA, the facility provides much needed behavioral health services for the Western Massachusetts region. The site is accessible to the downtown and within a short drive of Springfield and the Baystate Medical Center.

The facility is split into three buildings with the largest at four-stories, 95,000-sq.-ft. which will house 120 semi-private rooms and will be used by the JV to provide healthcare services. The second one-story 23,000-sq.-ft. building will have 30 private rooms for the Commonwealth of MA Department of Mental Health Continuing Care Program. The third building at 4,000-sq.-ft. houses a gym dedicated to therapy services. The exterior features multiple courtyards with three half basketball courts and picnic tables along with perimeter fencing around the site.

For a facility of this type, the project includes specialty windows, hardware, plumbing and light fixtures. The buildings have a combination of facade products including curtainwall, metal panels, EIFs and masonry.

The team used Drone Deploy to share site progress updates as most of the stakeholders and design team are located remotely. This technology allowed the team to collaborate and have access to weekly visuals to track construction progress. The drone flies the same prescribed path each flight and takes 1,200-1,300 photos that the software then stitches together to create an interactive 3D model of the site.

DPR has employed virtual design and construction (VDC) on the project for model-based coordination workflows including design coordination, RFIs and shop drawing reviews. This involved setting up the project with DPR tools, getting team alignment with all project stakeholders and creating a VDC schedule to meet the construction milestones. By using coordination during preconstruction, the team identified and mitigated issues that could have impacted the construction schedule such as verifying shaft dimensions needed for one of the buildings.

The coordinated model will be available to the field team to ensure trades are installing as per the model to avoid any conflicts in the field. The team is also planning to scan the kitchen area for installed stub up location verification with respect to coordinated locations from model. The model will be turned over to Baystate Health and Lifepoint Health for future facilities use.