A plan to move the Ottawa Hospital's Civic Campus to the Barrhaven suburbs is now before the provincial health ministry.
The Civic site of the Ottawa Hospital has been a fixture on Carling Avenue for nearly a century and the CEO of the hospital has said the move is "vital" because of the age of the building and an inability to expand.
The hospital is currently unable to expand on vacant property across the road from its current location because the federal government has deemed the farm land a historical area. Officials are now looking at a plan to move the hospital to a 60-acre site at Hunt Club Road and Woodroffe Avenue.
At a board of governors' meeting this week, Dr. Jack Kitts, president of the Ottawa Hospital, said final approval of the plan is expected this fall.
A plan to begin construction on a new multi-billion dollar facility in 2016 is pegged to take about 10 years to complete. The total cost of the move is estimated to be about $3.7 billion over 20 years.
Approval for the move must come from the hospital's board of directors, the Champlain Local Health Integration Network and Ontario's Ministry of Health.
