6 | Project Maunga: Taranaki Base Hospital - East Wing Building REGIONAL sam@contego.co.nz 022 522 4473 03 260 7888 www.contego.co.nz Proud to have completed the drainage & water infrastructure on Project Maunga Contact Phil on 027 555 1556 to discuss your requirements or email phil.civilworkstaranaki@gmail.com Specialists in: • Drainage - sewer, stormwater & watermains • Subdivision works • NPDC approved for stormwater & sewer connections • Roading, driveways & retaining walls • Cartage T TKaren Phelps Huge leap forward for Taranaki health The maternity and neonatal services within NEWB are a particular highlight, and include eight birthing rooms. “Having maternity and neonatal together in one place, with modern facilities, is something families in Taranaki have needed for a very long time.” A landmark new building has opened at Taranaki Base Hospital, marking the culmination of years of construction, and the single biggest investment in healthcare infrastructure the region has ever seen. The New East Wing Building (NEWB), gifted the Māori name Te Rau Mātāpuna o Taranaki, was officially opened on June 25, with patients beginning to be treated in the facility from 29 June. The six-storey, 22,000sqm acute services facility adds 55 patient spaces to the hospital, a 57% increase in capacity, and brings together under one roof, services that were previously spread across the campus. “This building represents a genuine step change for healthcare in Taranaki,” says Wendy Langlands, group director operations for Taranaki. “For the first time, our most critical services emergency, ICU, maternity, neonatal, radiology and laboratory are co-located in a way that dramatically improves how we can care for patients.” The Emergency Department has approximately doubled in size, and a new Acute Assessment Unit has been established to reduce unnecessary admissions and shorten lengths of stay. A rooftop helipad provides direct access to the Emergency Department, ICU and theatres, a feature designed to save critical minutes in life-or-death situations. Wendy says the scale of what sits behind the walls of NEWB is difficult to comprehend. The building contains over 62 kilometres of pipework, enough to wrap around the base of Mount Taranaki, and 290 kilometres of electrical cabling, more than the distance from New Plymouth to Palmerston North. More than 5950 lights illuminate its corridors and wards around the clock, and over 5100 sprinkler heads cover an area equivalent to roughly 15 rugby fields. Sustainability has been central to the design. NEWB has achieved a 5 Green Star Design certification, and is one of New Zealand’s largest, fully electric hospital facilities, operating primarily on electricity through advanced heat pump technology rather than gas. Rainwater harvesting, high-performance building insulation, and digital energy-management systems are among the features expected to reduce operating costs over time. “What’s remarkable is that this isn’t just a bigger building, it’s a smarter one,” says Wendy. “It’s been designed to keep operating during major events, to flex as demand grows, and to support the wellbeing of the staff who work here every day.” The maternity and neonatal services within NEWB are a particular highlight, she says, and include eight birthing rooms, with six of them equipped with pools, and a 12-cot neonatal unit co-located with the postnatal ward. “Having maternity and neonatal together in one place, with modern facilities, is something families in Taranaki have needed for a very long time,” says Wendy. NEWB forms the centrepiece of stage 2 of the Taranaki Base Hospital redevelopment, known as Project Maunga, which carries a total cost of $462.6 million. That figure includes a $53 million uplift approved in May 2025 to address post-Covid construction-cost escalation, though the project has been delivered within its approved budget. Construction commenced in June 2022 and finished approximately two months behind the original schedule, a minor variance that Wendy describes as within expectations for a build of this complexity. Together with earlier stages of Project Maunga, including the Renal Unit, and Energy Centre, the investments at Taranaki Base Hospital represent the largest health infrastructure programme in the region’s history. Other recent investments include the completion of a purpose-built cancer centre, bringing radiation therapy and oncology outpatients services together, as well as a stand-alone, four-bed mental health rehabilitation facility.
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