Froedtert Hospital in Milwaukee is undergoing a major campus expansion, with two Potain tower cranes supporting separate but coordinated construction projects.
The development includes a new six-storey parking garage featuring four elevators, three stair towers and a skywalk connecting it to an expansion of the hospital’s main building.
A Potain MD 559 tower crane is supporting construction of the parking structure, while a Potain MD 569 is working on the hospital expansion. Reynolds Rigging & Crane Service is providing planning, assembly, disassembly and crane operations for both projects.
With limited space available on the active healthcare campus, contractors selected tower cranes to reduce the need for ground staging and minimise the construction footprint. The project team’s goal is to complete the work without disrupting hospital operations.
Reynolds Rigging carefully coordinated trucking, crane assembly and future dismantling activities to protect the day-to-day functioning of the hospital throughout construction.
The parking garage was designed around a centrally positioned Potain MD 559, allowing a single crane to service the entire structure. The approach reduced the number of cranes and other equipment required on site while simplifying movement around the campus.
Once erected at the centre of the garage footprint, the MD 559 became the primary lifting solution for the project, supporting construction from the early concrete stages through to finishing works.
The crane, which has a capacity of 22 US tons, has been used to lift and place large precast planks, heavy rebar bundles, curtain wall frames, light poles and masonry materials.
Its central position was so important to the project that the garage’s construction sequence was planned around it. When construction is completed, the crane foundation will be repurposed as part of the facility’s snow-melt system, leaving no visible evidence of the crane’s former location.
The parking structure covers approximately 900,000 square feet and includes a number of structural challenges. Project planners determined that smaller cranes would not have been able to provide the reach and lifting capacity required for the build.
The MD 559’s performance has helped maintain productivity and safety while working within the tight constraints of a busy medical campus. According to the project team, the crane’s capabilities have also played an important role in keeping construction on schedule.
