The City of Cleveland is in court again, trying to block Cleveland Clinic from building a helipad atop Fairview Hospital. After the city zoning board refused to issue a permit for the helipad last year, saying that helicopters landing near Kamm’s Corner don’t fit in with its definition of a retail business district, the Clinic went to court.
In February, Common Pleas Judge Hollie Galagher ruled in favor of the Clinic, saying helicopters flying in and out do fit nicely with the city’s zoning for the area.
“I think the city will pull out all the stops on this one,” says Councilman Brian Cummins. And so far, it is. The city zoning board is now appealing the judge’s decision.
The helipad battle has been going on for well over a year, with West Park residents fearing the noise daily emergency flights to and from Fairview Hospital would bring. During community meetings, residents also argued that their property values would fall if the helipad was located there. The Clinic, meanwhile, says that a Fairview Hospital helipad would save lives. Right now, flights land in the Metroparks directly behind the hospital, and emergency and medical crews have to shuttle critically ill or injured patients into and out of the valley.
The Clinic has already started construction on a $76 million expansion project at the hospital that includes a much larger emergency department and an additional intensive care unit. The helipad, originally intended to be built on top of the new addition, is on hold until the court weighs in a second time. “We do believe it’s an important service to provide to the community,” says Clinic spokeswoman Heather Phillips.
This article appears in Apr 4-10, 2012.
Wait til the nearby Rocky River residents sue like they did with the Lakewood dog park, which the RR residents lost by the way.
How many of you actually live near Fairview Hospital? Is it not bad enough to endure sirens at all hours of the day and night, but now be exposed to helicopter noise?
LOL!!!
Christ, you a-holes! It’s called saving a human life! The extra minutes to Metro or the Clinic on the East Side may actually SAVE THE LIFE OF SOMEONE YOU KNOW OR LOVE….
And, the hours of the flights in and out of Fairview are restricted anyway because of the proximity to CLE Hopkins…
They already have the noisy revelers from the new “Little Dublin” strip of Irish meat-market bars along Lorain, so what are they whining about? What a bunch of wimps. So somebody dies coming up that hill…no skin off their asses.
If they really want something to bitch about, maybe they should move a mile south and try living directly under the main flight path at Hopkins, which is what I’ve dealt with for the past twenty years. People who come to visit me duck when they sit on our porch or deck.
These bozos near Fairview can complain to me all they like…and they have. But I won’t be listening to them…because I can no longer hear them very well. Or anybody else, for that matter. They’re just peeved because the FAA is no longer shelling out forty grand per house in soundproofing and other improvements, like they did for me and my neighbors. Tough noogies, folks. Deeal with it…or get the hell out. I hope you lose.
Chuckles the Clown
Clevelalnd clinic should have left well enough alone with HURON ROAD HOSPITAL, we had everything anyone needed in an emergency, the problem! it was in a black area, now most of us will die before they can get to a trauma center,Metro or Hillcrest, lifeflight is of no good use to those of us in the middle of these two hospitals. Thank you Cleveland Clinic for putting many lifes in danger by closing HURON Rd, shows just how much you care about human life.
Yeaaaaaah…Clinic wants helipad because it saves lives?
Reeeeeeeeeally…When did saving lives become more important than profit to the Clinic??
To GloryAnn: Here’s a rude awakening for you: Although hospitals are basically nonprofit entities, they have to make a profitable return on their services to survive. Now I’m going to ask you to be brutally honest with yourself. Of all the people who needed emergency services at Huron Road Hospital, what percentage of them do you suppose were able to pay for said services? Ergo, Metro General is positioned to take in these indigents. If it takes the victim of a gunshot wound who got himself in trouble because of a drug deal gone bad, a few more minutes to take an ambulance ride to W. 25th, who cares? I don’t. Either way, my Health and Human Services tax dollars are paying for this low life to survive so that he can live another day to do the same thing. As a sound business decision, Cleveland Clinic did the right thing in closing its revenue-losing free clinic.
I just can’t figure people out; they bitched when the clinic closed huron because it left only metro and hillcrest as the only tyrauma 1 center’s. now the clinic is expanding fairview’s emergancy room, and putting a helo pad on top insted of having to shuttle life threatening patiants that are flown to the metro park below the hospital. HELLO is anyone home, lights are on. “DUH”!!!!!!!!!!!
This is just another example of .. “White-Coat-Politians” running your life. You better OBEY Cleveland Clinic or you will be denied the already crappy health care they provide. They know who you are!! If a “hospital” can tell a community what’s good for them, then we all should just put room numbers on our houses and a beeper to call a nurse.
The hypocritical clinic will always try to run your life. I’m surprised that folks with medical needs that include using a helicoptor aren’t tossed out the door at 1000ft for being a smoker or being fat. Maybe that’s next.
I live about 3 blocks east of Fairview Hospital just north of Lorain. So please, read my comments and put yourself in my community’s position. Bear in mind that we don’t want people to die but another solution needs to be developed.
The constant airplanes flying low and the sirens from ambulances are like being audibly bombarded on a regular basis. I grew up on the street called West Park in the 60’s, 70’s and early 80’s (just a little bit further north from Lorain and Rocky River Drive intersection). The airplanes were not constant and disruptive as they are now. If I’m on the phone, talking to someone in my house or a neighbor outside, I have to wait until the planes or sirens have passed by to continue the conversation. Often times, our television picture either goes in and out or static because of the low flying planes and their air path.
Certain times of the day or night there are planes flying over our house about every 3 or 4 minutes, and it goes on for an extended time. I can’t imagine dealing with the additional disruption with helicopters coming in and out of the hospital. The new building is east of the main hospital and is a matter of maybe fifteen feet or less from the sidewalk.
I think a helicopter pad would be very loud for homes and businesses, as well as, distracting to drivers. There is heavy traffic in this area.
Why can’t a pathway be built from the valley side? The Cleveland Clinic Main Campus has walkways from one building to another. Why can’t they build something like that from the valley side? It could have an elevator or electric walk-way that moves the patient quickly and directly into the emergency area.
I want people to be saved but I also know that an equitable solution needs to be created.
does anyone really know what happens when lifeflight needs to pickup or drop someone off at fairview hospital? i am a former emt for a private ambulance company that used to pick up and drop off people to and from fairview for lifeflight. the helicopters land in the metropark, the patient has to be transferred to an ambulance with all the crew, the ambulance then has to take them up the nasty hill coming out of the metropark up the back of fairview hospital, same process goes for a patient that needs a transport by lifeflight to metro from fairview. these people are already critically sick or injured and they are being subjected to more transfers than should be safe for them. think about it, with all the time wasted to get patients to and from the metropark, that life that will be saved might be yours
Edward V…Who really does pay for medical problems over an insured and uninsured base called the general population? Do those like me who have paid large amounts on my employees insurance and mine through the many years in business have any rights to be treated for medical problems now that I am 62? Do I have the right to get social security and the other senior citizen bennies offered? In a dog-eat-dog jungle which the current republican party sees medical services as, should we just all let the poor and ill die as many of you cheer for? Do you think that all of the needs for medical service in the ghettos are gun-shot drug dealers and criminals? Do you see white collar crime as fine and dandy so long as it is legal or as long as the rich prick gets away with it. You sound as though you may think along these negative ideas which I see as our biggest problem facing America today.