SAN FRANCISCO (KCBS)— A milestone was celebrated Tuesday in the City of San Francisco’s biggest public work’s project. San Francisco General Hospital’s final steel beam was hoisted into place in the rebuild of its Acute Care Facility.

Hundreds of community members, hospital staff and city leaders wrote their signatures on the beam before it was lifted to the top of the building still under construction on Potrero Avenue.

“[It’s] The only time you’ll be able to write graffiti on a city building,” exclaimed Barbara Garcia, director of the Department of Public Health.

KCBS’ Anna Duckworth Reports:

She thanked San Francisco voters for their 2008 approval of the nearly billion-dollar bond that’s funding what is being built to the “highest standard of seismic resistance”.

Garcia called the move a commitment to the health of the entire city.

The hospital’s CEO, Sue Currin, said it’s challenging building in the middle of the current campus, but that it will all soon pay off.

“I’m really excited about our emergency room which will go from a size of 27 beds in our current emergency department, to 60 in our new hospital. We’ll be able to surge up to 120 during a disaster,” she said.

The new hospital is scheduled for completion in 2015.

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