DANVILLE -- Geisinger Medical Center is looking at an April date to begin construction on the $15.5 million five-level parking garage.

Construction Manager Mitch Leiby said Thursday officials are still finishing the design and working on the pricing of the precast structure.

A precast structure, he said, is built away from the site.

"The main structure will be built off-campus somewhere and then they truck all that in," he said. "So instead of a steel structure, it is all precast concrete. That is typical for parking garages."

Leiby said plans should be done this month and bids will be out for the rest of the project shortly after.

"We're still looking at an April start date," he said.

Robert Davies, Geisinger's vice president for system services, said the garage will have a 600-vehicle capacity initially and depending on parking demand, an expansion could add another 1,200 spaces, he said at a September meeting. The expansion would be added onto the existing structure.

The front entrance will be on Center Street, and a second entrance will be on the opposite side. A link to the Hospital of Advanced Medicine will be made and opened at the same time.

As for the addition to the campus, Leiby said construction for the Hospital of Advanced Medicine is moving along well.

The exterior is being enclosed, he said, and workers have started installing temporary heat. The roof is also beginning to take shape.

The construction of the rooms within the building is the next step, he said, which has already begun.

Completion is planned for the end of this year, with occupancy in early 2010.

The hospital expansion has nine levels and is 308,000 square feet.

It will contain 60 patient rooms and 60 acuity adaptable patient beds.