There will be no hospital in Queenstown.
That's the decision of Southern health bosses who yesterday announced they want to build a "a one-stop family heath centre" instead.
The Southern District Health Board plans for the medical centre to be either refurbished on the current hospital site, or built new at the nearby Remarkables Park development.
Late yesterday Queenstown's Remarkables Park Ltd and the Queenstown Medical Centre also announced they were going ahead with multimillion-dollar plans for an integrated medical services facility on a site at Remarkables Park zoned for Hospitals and Healthcare Services.
At the new SDHB centre patients will be referred to in-house general practitioners for non-urgent injuries.
It will potentially contain services such as dentists, a diagnostic laboratory and pharmacy.
The board's chief executive Brian Rousseau yesterday said whatever site option was taken, he hoped the new centre would be open within a two and a half-year time frame.
The move was in line with a Government policy of providing better, quicker and more convenient healthcare, and was supported by Health Minister Tony Ryall, Mr Rousseau said.
The main advantages of the move were that all different types of treatment would be available at one location, and the centre would attract a lot more specialists, Mr Rousseau said.
"This model has been used around the world and is well established.
It will provide a consortium of providers working together ... and I cannot see a disadvantage," Mr Rousseau said.
An elderly care unit currently attached to the Lakes District Hospital would be retained under the new proposal.
Concept plans show space set aside for palliative care, radiology, surgery and mental health.
Hospital grade care would be available at the medical centre but urgent cases would be stabilised then sent on to larger regional hospitals – which is the system in place at the moment.
"Patients will be seen by a triage nurse who will determine the urgency of the condition. The patient will then be either referred to a general practice, or a hospital doctor," Mr Rousseau said.
Wakatipu Health Trustee and executive officer Maria Cole yesterday said she was angered by the announcement because it did not address various public concerns clearly outlined to the board almost a year ago.
"We are very angry and disappointed at the high-handed manner in which the decision was delivered – it was delivered as a fait accompli," she said.
"There is no mention of community whatsoever.
"Our independent community consultation revealed huge concern about the Queenstown Medical Centre monopolising the provision of hospital services.
"The DHB denies there has been any kind of deal done, but it seems curious that QMC and its partners are proceeding with a multimillion-dollar development at Remarkables Park without some kind of assurity on a commercial basis."
Remarkables Park co-director Alastair Porter said the new centre they had announced would start on a 3200sqm site, but would have the capacity to more than double in size.