New Chattanooga surgery center underway on Riverfront Parkway

Staff photo by Troy Stolt / Bob Elliott, left, president of Noon Development, and Dr. Jay Jolley, an investor in the future Riverfront Surgery Center, talk at the construction site of the facility on Riverfront Parkway.
Staff photo by Troy Stolt / Bob Elliott, left, president of Noon Development, and Dr. Jay Jolley, an investor in the future Riverfront Surgery Center, talk at the construction site of the facility on Riverfront Parkway.

A new medical building underway at the former Alstom site in Chattanooga will hold an independent surgery center specializing in spine, pain management and orthopedic procedures.

Riverfront Surgery Center will offer same-day surgical care at the facility that will have four operating rooms, said Chattanooga physician Dr. Jay Jolley.

"It's driven by our desire to create value for the patient," said Jolley, a spine surgeon who is among a handful of physicians investing in the new facility that will go on the ground floor of Riverbend Medical Center at The Bend on Riverfront Parkway. "We've assembled a fantastic group of surgeons to open this center."

Patients will benefit from better outcomes at the ambulatory surgery center, Jolley said, and they'll save from 30% to 40% than having a procedure at a hospital.

"As an independent center, Riverfront can easily cater to the needs of our patients," he said. "We offer our patients flexibility, convenient parking and the best possible experience during their surgeries."

Also, because some patients are expected to come from outside the city, they and their families will benefit from the center's proximity to downtown's hotels and restaurants, Jolley said.

"Patients will come in all four directions," he said, citing its availability to the interstate highways. "It's accessible to the tri-state area."

Bob Elliott, president of Chattanooga-based Noon Development, said the developer likes the area for medical space, noting it already has raised a facility nearby.

The 2.5-acre site at 1247 Riverfront Parkway will hold about 25,000 square feet within two stories. An adjacent 10,000-square-foot expansion is planned for the second level with parking underneath, Elliott said.

photo Staff photo by Troy Stolt / Dr. Jay Jolley checks out the progress on the building of the Riverfront Surgery Center going up at 1247 Riverfront Parkway.

The surgery center is expected to open in the fall and is part of the development within The Bend, a 121-acre tract holding the former Alstom manufacturing site on Chattanooga's waterfront.

Elliott said the center will offer both covered pickup and drop-off areas.

He said Noon Development is leasing the remaining 12,000 square feet in the building. Elliott declined to discuss how much money is going into the development.

Each physician at the center will offer different services and treatments. The services include hip and knee replacements, spine procedures such as fusions and herniated disc treatments, and pain management treatments including epidural steroid injections and more.

The investors in the surgery center are Jolley, neurosurgeon Dr. David Wiles, orthopedic surgeon Dr. John Chrostowski, pain management specialist Dr. John Rett Blake, orthopedic surgeon Dr. Gary Voytik, and orthopedic surgeon Dr. Thomas Brown, officials said.

Select other surgeons that will use the space to offer procedures within the center include orthopedic surgeon Dr. Matt Bernard, orthopedic surgeon Dr. Rickey Hutcheson, Dr. Shelly Brand, Dr. Joshua Lawson, Dr. Michael Hermann, and others, according to officials.

The Bend is undergoing an array of new development. Early this summer, battery materials maker Novonix agreed to buy a 400,000-square-foot structure as it invests about $160 million and creates 300 jobs.

The former Alstom property was renamed The Bend after Chattanooga businessmen Jimmy White and Hiran Desai bought the parcel from GE Power for $30 million in 2018.

White said recently that every remaining building at the site either has been sold or is leased. The 800 people now working on the tract is more than three times the number GE Power employed when it announced the facility's closing in 2015, although it is still far below the 5,700 employees the former Combustion Engineering Corp., once had at the site when C-E was the biggest manufacturing employer in Chattanooga nearly a half century ago.

Noon Development has projects across the United States. In Chattanooga, its medical developments include The Atrium, 901 Riverfront Parkway, The Lyerly Medical Pavilion, and Bradley Heritage Medical Park.

Contact Mike Pare at mpare@timesfreepress.com or at 423-757-6318.

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