NCH urgent care on Marco Island moving closer to construction with site plans approved

Construction on a new urgent care facility planned since 2021 on Marco Island will start once permits are approved, now that site plans have been OK'd.

Marco Island Planning Board, in October approved NCH Healthcare's site development plan for two-story building to replace its existing 30-year-old single-story building at 40 S. Heathwood Drive. The new facility will be built on another location on the property, allowing the existing urgent care to remain open during construction, Planning Manager Mary Holden told the board.

"It looks really good," Holden said of the plans. "We’re actually excited to have a new urgent care facility on the island."

The planned 25,000-square-foot building will be on a corner of South Heathwood Drive and San Marco Road on the south side of an existing NCH healthcare center that will remain, according to site plans by Naples-based RWA Engineering. The current urgent care center is on the north side of the healthcare center.

Physicians Regional Healthcare System also operates a medical center with urgent care and other services on the island, at 1839 San Marco Road.

Ambulance and patient entrances separate

An architect rendering by Tampa-based Chancey shows the NCH ambulance entrance from San Marco Road. The patient entrance will be from the Bald Eagle/South Heathwood side, going around the existing office building, Chris Wright, chief executive officer of RWA, told the planning board Oct. 6.

Construction can begin as soon as permits are approved on the approximately $18 million building and campus remodel, Wright said.

"The applications for building permits are in," he said, and donations made to NCH allow construction to begin as soon as those are approved.Marco Island residents Barbara and Steve Slaggie are contributing $5 million as a matching grant toward building.

The building will not bear the Slaggies’ name; however, we are working with them on another naming that will appropriately recognize their commitment," NCH Director of Marketing and Communications Shawn McConnell said in an email.

"It (the donation) allowed the project to move ahead quicker than what was originally planned, which is like the summer of next year," Wright told the planning board.

As construction begins on the urgent care center, next door construction on a new assisted living facility should be completed.

More:NCH Healthcare expanding Marco Island Urgent Care Center

Neighboring assisted living facility construction continues

Construction of an assisted living and memory care facility on San Marco Road just east of the NCH campus has resumed and is now expected to be completed this time next year.

The Watermark, which will have 68 apartments, had to stop construction to relocate some burrowing owls, which are on the U.S. Fish & Wildlife threatened species list.

"That was one of the major hurdles that put everything to a stop," Watermark regional sales representative Steve Foss said in an interview. "We had to make sure they were relocated safely."

The owls have been moved, he said.

"All boots on the ground now and construction has resumed, and our opening date should be this time in 2024," Foss said.The assisted living and memory center being built by Arizona-based company Watermark Retirement Communities took years for approval.

It began with rezoning recommendation to commercial for almost 12 acres at Heathwood Drive and San Marco Road to a planned-unit development district in November 2018. Watermark's original plan was for 166 units but couldn't get city approval with residents opposed to such a large facility on the property. City Council rejected the rezoning 2020.

Plans were finalized and zoning approved by Marco City Council in 2021 after fewer units were proposed, along with restrictions to inpatient care that prohibit psychiatric and substance abuse treatment.

Watermark's facility will include a passive park along a waterway.

Details about unit layouts and pricing should be available in the second quarter of 2024, Foss said.

"We have a list right now of 30 people," he said. "It’s all Marco Island people. They’re really excited about it."