10:00 PM PDT on Friday, May 8, 2009
By AARON BURGIN
The Press-Enterprise

A road that will be the main access to a $200 million hospital in northeast Murrieta is on schedule to be completed before the hospital opens, city officials recently told the hospital operators.

The city recently started transforming Meadowlark from a two-lane road and dirt path to a four-lane thoroughfare by selecting an engineering firm to do the project's preliminary study, Murrieta officials said.

When completed, Meadowlark will be four lanes between Clinton Keith and Keller roads.

Ed Crisostomo / The Press-Enterprise
When completed, Meadowlark Lane will be four lanes between Clinton Keith and Keller roads. People going to Loma Linda University Medical Center-Murrieta will use Meadowlark to get to Baxter Road, the hospital's location.

The road widening is critical because people going to Loma Linda University Medical Center-Murrieta, a portion of which is scheduled to open in January 2011, will use Meadowlark to access Baxter Road, where the hospital is.

Hospital officials must complete Baxter, which peters out into a dirt path just east of the hospital site.

The hospital's primary sewer line will run below Baxter and Meadowlark.

City and hospital officials met last week to discuss progress on the hospital and preliminary construction. Workers have almost completed the hospital's five-story steel-beam shell, which has become a prominent landmark in the city's Antelope Road corridor.

The officials said they are on schedule for a January 2011 completion of the first portion of the hospital and of Meadowlark and Baxter roads.

John Piconi, chairman of the board of Physicians Hospital of Murrieta LLC, which comprises half of the hospital joint venture, said the city did not give any guarantees but he remains confident it will come through.

"They understand we need good access, and they are on the same path," Piconi said.

The City Council on April 21 awarded a $36,800 contract to Albert A. Webb & Associates engineering firm to perform an alignment study, which will yield a conceptual design of Meadowlark.

Final engineering and design of the road, as well as an environmental study, will follow. The pre-construction process should take about a year, Thomas said, leaving the city about six months to construct the road.

"That is all it should take," City Public Works Director Patrick Thomas said.

Reach Aaron Burgin at 951-375-3733 or aburgin@pe.com