The final steel beam on the new Idaho Elks Children’s Pavilion, under construction across from St. Luke’s downtown Boise hospital, is set to take its position.

The steel beam that will be the last lifted into place is 21 feet long and 305 pounds. In May, hundreds of St. Luke’s employees signed the beam, adding messages to future patients and caregivers. Crews plan to position it at the high roof level on the west stair tower.

The state-of-the-art, four-story, 100,000-square-foot Children’s Pavilion will connect to St. Luke’s Children’s Hospital via a skybridge, doubling clinical space for pediatric services and uniting most of the area’s pediatric specialists under one roof.

In addition to doctors’ offices, the Children’s Pavilion will include a Family Resource Center, an area designed for the siblings of young patients and a demonstration kitchen where families can learn to cook for children with special dietary needs.

The $42 million facility, built with the support of community and $22 million in donations, is scheduled to open in summer of 2019. 

The next outwardly visible activity will have to do with the skybridge, with construction crews preassembling the structure at ground level nearby. 

Construction crews will preassemble the 123 foot box truss sky bridge over two months. Once complete, the 90-ton structure will be hoisted by two cranes, rolled down Avenue B and set in place over one weekend. The construction technique was selected in order to have the least impacts to roads and traffic, and proved to be the safest. That placement is expected to happen at the end of the year, and will result in several roads closures. St. Luke’s will provide traffic impact and road closure information as far in advance as possible.

The bridge will be supported by Children’s Pavilion on the east side and a new concrete frame on the west side. It was designed to be 12 feet away from the hospital and completely independent so it can move in the event of an earthquake. When complete, the sky bridge will be Idaho’s only bridge to connect two buildings over a road.

Once complete, not only will the Children’s Pavilion double clinical space for St. Luke’s Children’s Hospital, but also improve vital services by uniting most of the area’s pediatric specialists under one roof.

“That allows for more efficient care, and greater ease for parents and children with complex medical needs,” said St. Luke’s Children’s Hospital Medical Director Dr. Kathryn Beattie. “Instead of multiple stops to various doctors spread out around town, patients will instead be able to see experts in one kid-friendly location in one day.”