VANCOUVER -- A much anticipated hospital will be built in Surrey's Cloverdale neighbourhood, the province announced Monday.
The new hospital was first announced two years ago, but no details – including its location – were provided at the time.
At a news conference at the Museum of Surrey the province announced it would be built at 5500 180 St., next to the Kwantlen Polytechnic University campus.
The new hospital will have inpatient beds, an emergency department, operating rooms, laboratory and diagnostic services and outpatient services, the Ministry of Health said.
With a location secured, the project will move on to what the province described as the "business-planning phase."
The community will be asked to weigh in as plans are put in place.
Details including scope and budget will be finalized, and when the plan is approved, procurement and construction will begin.
When the project was announced back in 2017, Health Minister Adrian Dix said the existing Surrey Memorial Hospital provided first-class care, "but we recognize with a rapidly growing community that access to this care is becoming difficult for a great number of people."
He did not provide a timeline for the project, but said hospitals typically take between six and 10 years to build.
Since that time, the province opened a mental health and substance use centre in the city, and outfitted an outpatient care and surgery centre with a new magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) suite, but there have been no updates in the last two years about the new hospital.
This is a developing news story and will be updated throughout the day.
With files from CTV News Vancouver's Nafeesa Karim in Surrey
