WINSTON-SALEM, N.C., April 15 /PRNewswire/ -- A ceremony Thursday heralded the start of construction of the first building in the expansion of the Piedmont Triad Research Park (PTRP).
Biotechnology Research Facility 1 will be a 160,000-square-foot, five-story structure that will provide laboratory and office space for researchers from Wake Forest University Health Sciences and Winston-Salem State University. Additional space will be shelled in and held for biotechnology companies.
"This new space will be a major enhancement for the research park," said Bill Dean, the president of Idealliance, the community not-for-profit that manages and markets the research park. "It will provide much needed facilities for new scientific discovery and future research and development."
"We are grateful for the growing support of the public and private business sectors as well as the commitments at the state and federal level to see the park development become a reality," said Richard H. Dean, M.D., president and chief executive officer of Wake Forest University Health Sciences. "This is just the beginning."
The project will also include a 450-space, six-level parking deck that will be constructed on the site of the existing parking lot behind the Piedmont Triad Community Research Center (PTCRC). The PTCRC houses the Department of Physiology and Pharmacology of Wake Forest University School of Medicine and Project Strengthen from Winston-Salem State University.
At the ceremony, Assistant Secretary of Commerce Linda Weiner said the state of North Carolina has committed $4.5 million for the "necessary road infrastructure to support the (new) facility and the continued development of the park."
She said that Gov. Mike Easley and Commerce Secretary Jim Fain strongly support expansion of the research park and the recruitment of biotechnology businesses to locate here. Recently the state's first satellite office of the N.C. Biotechnology Center opened in the park.
The project will cost about $70 million. Some of the school's basic science programs will be relocated to the building.
According to Rick Ericson, project manager for the architect, O'Brien/Atkins Associates of Research Triangle Park, the structure will be more than 90 feet tall. Construction is expected to be completed by the fall of 2005.
The Community Planning and Economic Development Initiative of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development has made two grants totaling $1.1 million for planning the structures.
Wake Forest University Baptist Medical CenterCONTACT: Robert Conn, rconn@wfubmc.edu, or Shannon Koontz,shkoontz@wfubmc.edu, or Karen Richardson, krchrdsn@wfubmc.edu, all of WakeForest University Baptist Medical Center, +1-336-716-4587
