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  President Satish K. Tripathi and Council Chair Jeremy M. Jacobs present a commendation to Mia Jorgensen, outgoing student representative on the UB Council. Photo: DOUGLAS LEVERE

By SUE WUETCHER

Published: June 21, 2012

Collaboration. Partnerships.

Those are the watchwords behind the continuing growth of the Buffalo Niagara Medical Campus (BNMC), BNMC president and executive director Matthew K. Enstice told members of the UB Council on Monday.

Meeting in the heart of the medical campus—in the Visualization Room of the Center for Computational Research in UB’s New York State Center of Excellence in Bioinformatics and Life Sciences—council members heard Enstice talk about the medical campus in general, and UB campus architect Robert Shibley, dean of the School of Architecture and Planning, address specifics of the university’s plan to move the School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences to the BNMC.

Assisted by some high-tech visual aids, Enstice gave council members a primer on the development of the BNMC, project by project.

Growth of the medical campus began in earnest in 2002 with the development of a master plan designed to “bring all the institutions together—all the major players” to clean up the area and build some new buildings, he said. The first to build on the campus under the master plan were Hauptman-Woodward Medical Research Institute, UB—with the Center of Excellence—and Roswell Park Cancer Institute with its Center for Genetics and Pharmacology.

This first wave of construction “was really important at the time because it was a big part of the feeling that we believe we can do stuff down here,” he said, recalling that when initial discussions about the projects began, the common sentiment of the Western New York community was “Good luck. It’ll never happen. It’s Buffalo.”

He attributed the success of those projects—400,000 square feet of space totaling $200 million in construction costs—to the leadership of all three institutions coming together to make it happen.

The impetus from those projects continued with UB’s purchase of the former M. Wile building at Goodell and Ellicott streets—now the UB Downtown Gateway—and construction of a new Educational Opportunity Center adjacent to the gateway, which is slated to be completed in 2013.

BNMC bought a nearby building on Ellicott Street and converted it into research-and-development space for private-sector life sciences and biotech companies to commercialize research by UB faculty. Enstice noted that the 128,000-square-foot Thomas R. Beecher Jr. Innovation Center has only 15,000 square feet left for development. “You’re starting to see baby steps, building momentum and bringing people forward,” he said of the Innovation Center.

Development then moved to the north end of the medical campus, and Enstice said this is where UB, under the leadership of President Satish K. Tripathi and Michael Cain, vice president for health sciences and dean of the medical school, “really stepped up and brought people together. From our community perspective, this was really, really important.”

UB’s partnering with Kaleida Health to build the Gates Vascular Institute (GVI) and Clinical and Translational Research Center (CTRC)—which, Enstice noted, may be the first time a SUNY institution has joined with a health care system on such a project—was a key element because it “creates flexibility and builds in collaboration and partnership,” he said.

He pointed to other successes, including a 2,000-car parking garage, as well as consolidation of Kaleida’s skilled nursing facilities at the HighPointe on Michigan facility between North and High streets.

And upcoming projects include construction of a new Women & Children’s Hospital at Ellicott and High streets, a medical office building and ambulatory surgery center on Main Street between High and Goodrich streets, and the soon-to-be relocated School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences at Main and High streets.

Enstice cited some numbers that he said reflect, from a community perspective, accomplishments at the BNMC: In 2002, 7,000 employees worked at the BNMC. By the end of 2012, 12,000 people will be working there. Once Women & Children’s Hospital, the ambulatory surgery center/office building and the UB medical school projects are completed, as well as an expected expansion project at Roswell Park Cancer Institute, 17,000 people will be working at the BNMC by the end of 2016.

He noted, however, that collaboration is essential for these projects to move forward.

“The only way we’re going to work through logistically in making this place flow appropriately is if we do it all together because the cost is too expensive and the logistics are too challenging,” he said, adding that the BNMC has had a “great relationship” with UB. “I can only see it going forward for the community.”

Shibley opened his part of the presentation by noting that excellence, engagement and efficiency—the “3 Es” that serve as the guiding principles of Tripathi’s vision for UB—also serve as the basis for the new downtown master plan, which is part of Building UB, the university’s comprehensive physical plan.

Building UB carries six core value principles, Shibley said. The first and foremost of both the “3 Es” and Building UB is excellence in the university’s academic work. “It’s all about that,” he said. “We might indeed be building downtown, but the fundamental purpose of it is to advance our institution,” he said.

This goal for academic excellence suggests that UB is one university with three campuses, he said. “That means we need to do everything we can to sustain and connect and interrelate each of our campus investments,” he said, noting that each campus is striving for excellence in the context of its host community. “So we see that what’s good for us is also good for the city of Buffalo, good for the town of Amherst and good for the regional framework for growth in Erie and Niagara counties.”

Shibley pointed out that Buffalo’s master planning document is composed of four parts, “and every single part identifies the prominence and importance of the Buffalo Niagara Medical Campus.

“Finding ourself so well-aligned with these plans begins to make the kind of story that Matt [Enstice] just described really take hold,” he said.

The most recent part of the story, the new UB medical school at Main and High street, is in the design phase, Shibley noted. That phase will be completed in 2013, with construction completed by August 2016 for occupancy in September 2016.

A second phase of the project will build out just east of the Allen Street Metro station, he said, bringing the medical school “full face front” to the planned new Women & Children’s Hospital and the medical office building that will include the ambulatory surgery center. “So you begin to see the density of immediate adjacency”—the medical school, GVI-CTRC, medical office building, Women & Children’s Hospital, Buffalo General Medical Center and Roswell Park Cancer Institute all within several blocks.

“Can you imagine recruiting now in the med school; how attractive that co-location is? How powerful that is also for those in industry interested in the intellectual fruits of the labors that will occur there?

“It gives the university and the BNMC a front door on Main Street,” Shibley said. “It is the entrance to downtown, the entrance to the medical campus, the entrance to Allentown and it is an important part of the future vitality of the Fruit Belt.”

In other business at Monday’s meeting, the council unanimously approved naming the football center at UB Stadium the Murchie Family Football Center and the equipment room in the stadium the Ronald Balter and Family Equipment Room.

The namings honor Tunney S. Murchie, MBA ’76 & BS ’75, a former member of the UB men’s hockey program, and his wife, Deanna L. Murchie, BS ’74, and Ronald Balter, BA ’80, former team manager for the UB football program and a member of the Dr. and Mrs. Edmond J. Gicewicz Family UB Athletics Hall of Fame, for their generous support of UB Athletics.