We have a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to transform Whipps Cross hospital and the wider site, as part of the Government’s new hospital building programme.
We have been speaking with staff, patients and our local communities to develop our plans. Our vision is to create ‘a hospital in a garden and a garden in a hospital’, reconnecting the hospital with its Epping Forest setting and the healing benefits of nature.
The new hospital will have all the same core NHS hospital services - A&E, maternity, operating theatres, intensive care, imaging, inpatients and outpatients. But in new modern facilities, with more clinical space and more care provided on the same day. This will reduce the need for admissions and give a better experience for patients and staff.
The hospital has a flexible and adaptable design. This mean we can respond better to changing and future healthcare demands, including a pandemic.
The new hospital will provide:
- Over a third more clinical space than the current hospital
- A better and more efficient use of space to make it easier for staff, patients and visitors to move around
- More than 70% single rooms, compared to around 10% today
- The flexibility and adaptability to respond to changing healthcare needs in the future
- Space for future expansion of the hospital if necessary
- A sustainable building designed to achieve the target of net zero carbon
Outline Planning Applications approved
A big milestone for the programme was getting the planning applications approved for the new hospital by the Waltham Forest Council planning committee on 24 November 2021. We submitted two outline planning applications: one application for the hospital and car park, and another application for the wider site. View the application on Waltham Forest Council's website by searching for the application reference numbers 211245 and 211244.
Before we submitted our planning applications, we asked for feedback on our emerging plans for the hospital and the wider site with the public, patients and staff in focus groups, workshops, public meetings and through an online survey with more than 1,152 responses.
View our booklet, published in February 2021, which provides more information on the proposals.