Waypoint Centre for Mental Health Care

EllisDon

Waypoint Centre for Mental Health Care is a 350,000 square foot, 312-bed psychiatric hospital located on Georgian Bay in the Town Penetanguishene, approximately 150 km northwest of Toronto. The facility provides an extensive range of both acute and longer-term psychiatric inpatient and outpatient services to all of Simcoe County, which is part of Dufferin County and the southern portion of Muskoka/Parry Sound. In addition, MHCP provides Ontario's only maximum security forensic hospital for clients served by both the mental health and justice systems. The hospital is recognized for the provision of exceptional care to those most needing mental health services and for its contributions to the understanding of mental illness.

Built on the hospital's existing site, the new hospital will replace the 160-bed Oak Ridge Facility and the 20-bed Brebeuf Facility, offering a larger, more modern space for treatment and care of people with mental health disorders who have been involved with the criminal justice system. The new facility will shed the penal image, as it portrays a true home, neighbourhood and centre of life for its patients. The new welcoming "front door" feeling that invites you into a spacious patient environment. The perfect combination of concrete and steel elements will be used to compliment the architectural design. The acoustic design requirements will prove to be challenging, but our previous experience the acoustical recommendations have been tried and tested in real world situation to ensure that the acoustical performace objectives are met.

The mechanical services have been designed to provide flexibility and adaptability. The electrical distribution system is design to provide high levels of redundancy and minimize single points of failure. The landscape strategy involves a combination of cultural landscape (entrance, courtyards and site recreation space), and natural landscapes (hedgerows, agrarian landscape) to assist with wayfinding and site circulation, natural succession, in select areas, and habitat restoration at the storm water management pond. Once complete, the new facility will consolidate MHCP into a more efficient, integrated complex.

The project is targeting LEED(r) Gold.