Community

Former OVMC Bricks Will Be Donated to Preservation Group for Distribution

WHEELING - As the former Ohio Valley Medical Center buildings get knocked down, some former employees of the hospital are wondering if they will get to keep a piece of the facility as a keepsake.

Douglass Harrison, president and CEO of WVU Medicine Wheeling Hospital, said there will be bricks made available at a later time.

"WVU Medicine is intending to have 200-300 bricks available to the OVGH Preservation Society," he said. "It will be up to them on how they wish to distribute them. Those will be available as the older buildings are being demolished and our team secures some of the bricks."

Demolition of the buildings are occurring to make way for a new regional cancer center on the land by WVU Medicine. The cancer centers at WVU Medicine Wheeling and Reynolds Memorial hospitals will be consolidated into one large facility at the site.

Meanwhile, the society also wanted to preserve the large "OVGH" letters on the building. When the hospital was operating the letters would be lit at night.

"As we have stated to the OVGH Preservation Society, WVU Medicine will remove the letters from the building and hand those letters off to the city of Wheeling for safekeeping," Harrison said. "There is no timeline for this other than when the demolition team starts the demo work on that particular building."

Harrison noted the demolition process is going well, to date.

"We are either on pace, or slightly ahead of schedule, in all phases of demo," he said. "The Mental Health building should be down no later than mid next week, and asbestos abatement is in various stages throughout the rest of the buildings, though all on schedule."

The entire project is expected to be completed in about five years. The cost estimate to build the new facility ranges from $75 million to $90 million. Once open, the cancer center will employ about 150 people and see an estimated 40,000 patient visits each year.