Walnut Creek approves John Muir Medical Center's expansion

John Muir Health, one of the outer East Bay's most dominant health-care systems, won unanimous approval last week from the Walnut Creek City Council for a $460 million expansion and seismic retrofit of its 322-bed campus there. Included in the project at John Muir Medical Center, approved Feb. 22:

• A five-story addition that will replace a seven-story tower built in 1965 now slated for demolition.

• A 757-stall parking garage.

• A 42,000-square-foot surgery center.

John Muir also won city approval for a master plan calling for several other additions by 2050, and tearing down several structures dating to the mid-1970s and late 1980s. Overall, the two-hospital system plans to spend $600 million over the next four years on partial seismic rebuilds and expansions at its Walnut Creek campus and its 254-bed campus in Concord, formerly known as Mt. Diablo Medical Center, CEO Ken Anderson told the Business Times.

Anderson described the upgrades as necessary to keep John Muir in the same league with high-end rivals like San Francisco's California Pacific Medical Center, Stanford Hospital & Clinics and UCSF Medical Center. The system also needs to expand its jam-packed Walnut Creek hospital and comply with state-mandated seismic requirements.