A joint venture of Turner Construction and Gilbane Building Co. has begun construction on a $1.7 billion public health facility in New York state, according to a Jan. 27 announcement from New York City-based Turner. Architect HOK is serving as design partner.
The new Wadsworth Center will bring five unconnected sites across the Greater Albany area together into a single modern campus, according to the announcement. Designs for the center feature a five-story, 663,000-square-foot laboratory.
The Wadsworth Center — which was first established in 1901 and celebrates its 125th anniversary this year — is recognized by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and other federal agencies as a national reference center for a wide range of infectious diseases, environmental hazards and toxicological threats.
The laboratory will be located on the W. Averell Harriman Campus in Albany and house nearly 800 staff. The facility is designed to adapt to evolving needs over its lifetime with an emphasis on energy efficiency and sustainability, per Turner.
“By consolidating five legacy sites into a flexible, fully electric facility with robust sequencing infrastructure, we’re creating a resilient workplace that will serve New Yorkers for decades,” said David Schwartz, HOK’s director of science and technology.
According to the release, the center runs a number of public health programs, including:
- Public health emergency response. In 2022, it led detection and surveillance of the 2022 poliovirus outbreak, including identification of the first U.S. case of paralytic polio.
- Wastewater surveillance and diagnostics. It serves as New York state’s primary wastewater surveillance laboratory for the detection of emerging pathogens and antimicrobial resistance.
- Environmental health. The center functions as the state’s lead Safe Drinking Water Act laboratory and is a national leader in detection, monitoring and reporting.
- Diagnostic testing pipelines. Wadworth’s diagnostic developments have advanced testing for tuberculosis, Mpox and influenza.
- Newborn screening. Efforts advance screening of newborns for more than 210,000 babies annually and more than 50 disorders.
- Regulatory and oversight initiatives. The facility sets and enforces rigorous statewide laboratory standards, exceeding federal requirements.
Healthcare projects are one sector keeping construction planning momentum on track amid a broader industry slowdown, according to the Dodge Momentum Index. The measure tracks nonresidential construction jobs entering the planning stages and leads the industry by a full year. Momentum rose 7% month over month in December, and was up 37% year over year compared to 2024, increases Dodge largely attributed to data center and healthcare builds.
