Samaritan Medical Center's main parking lot for visitors and patients is closed as crews ready for construction of the hospital's new 130,000-square-foot patient pavilion.

SMC spokeswoman Krista A. Kittle said the closure is the biggest change due to the $61 million expansion and renovation project.

"We don't anticipate anything else as major as this," she said.

Patients and visitors will park in alternative areas on the hospital campus that have been redesigned from staff parking to patient/visitor parking.

The temporary parking layout includes a lot at the South end of Washington Street closest to Samaritan Keep Home and Centennial Apartments. The parking lot behind SMC at Sherman and Pratt streets also will be for patients and visitors.

Hospital staff has been, and will continue, parking at Samaritan Medical Plaza, 1575 Washington St., and ride a shuttle to the hospital, Ms. Kittle said.

All hospital entrances, with the exception of the main lobby and emergency department, are locked after 8 p.m. each day.

If a patient needs to access the hospital after that time, he or she could park in the lot closest to Samaritan Keep Home, Ms. Kittle said.

The main lobby entrance is open until 11 p.m., while the emergency department entrance is open 24 hours.

Signs are posted around the hospital campus so visitors and patients are directed to the proper parking lots. Staff and security officers are posted around SMC to help direct people around campus.

The patient pavilion is the second phase of the project. Its work is being completed simultaneously with that of phase one, a three-story parking garage.

Renovation of 71,500 square feet of hospital space is the project's third phase.

HBE Corp., St. Louis, Mo., the project's developer, will help construct the patient pavilion so that it houses an expanded emergency department, new intensive care and progressive care units, new and expanded operating rooms and a new medical/surgical unit with private patient rooms. A new atrium lobby also is part of that phase.

"This is the area that'll be dedicated to patient care," Ms. Kittle said. "It's the most exciting part of the project."

Parking maps are available on SMC's Web site, in the main lobby, at the information desk and in individual departments at the hospital and Samaritan Keep Home, or by calling the SMC public relations office at 785-4584.