A rendering of the Cooper University Health Care facility taking over the space at Moorestown Mall, formerly occupied by the Sears store. This is the elevation facing Route 38.
Cooper University Health Care's largest ambulatory center, with about 200 employees working on three floors, will open in the old Sears department store building at the Moorestown Mall, the Township Planning Board decided on Thursday night.
Board members voted 9-0 to approve Cooper's plans and bulk variances for the center as part of the transformation of the struggling mall into a multi-use property. Cooper purchased the space and parking from mall owner Pennsylvania Real Estate Investment Trust (PREIT) for about $10 million.
"This location has everything we're looking for, from the size of the building to the necessary parking and convenient access from a high-volume road," Dr. Anthony Mazarelli, co-president and CEO of Cooper, testified before the board.
The front of the Cooper facility — 166,000 square feet on 6.23 acres — will face Route 38. Large signs and Cooper's signature red color will be on each side of the building.
Moorestown resident Mazarelli noted that three generations of his family have lived in Moorestown and that, besides him, 144 of Cooper's overall 8,932 employees also live in the town.
"We deliberately chose Moorestown to build what will be our largest ambulatory facility, which allows us to bring our specialists closer” to where our patients live and work, Mazarelli told board members. "We are very excited that Cooper’s project will be a major piece of the transformation and redevelopment of this mall property."
The new Cooper facility will face Route 38 and have direct access to it on the Moorestown Mall property, according to plans.
A Pennsylvania developer, Bel Canto Asset Growth Fund LLC of Plymouth Meeting, plans 375 apartments — with 20% of them set aside for affordable housing — on the southeast corner of the mall parking lot near Boscov's.
Mall owner PREIT last year announced that the 375 apartments and a new hotel at the partly unused mall would be the first phase of its development plan, which could include as many as 1,065 multifamily units to shore up its mall investment. The only anchor store remaining is Boscov's.
"We will not be a nursing home. We will not be an emergency department. We will not be a trauma center and we will not be a hospital," Dr. Christine Winn, Cooper senior vice president of ambulatory operations, testified before the board.
Cooper will turn the old Sears store into a three-floor facility with a range of services, with 479 parking spaces for patients and staff. Some of the signs proposed for the building note cancer treatment.
The first floor will house multi-specialty clinic spaces, labs and cardiac testing, Winn said. The second floor will be dedicated to ambulatory surgery, radiology and infusion. The basement will include physical therapy and radiation treatment for oncology patients.
Winn explained that Cooper will run two shifts from 5 a.m. to 10 p.m. for its approximately 200 full- and part-time staff and physicians. Between 50% and 75% of its employees will work from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., Cooper representatives testified.
Winn and other Cooper representatives at the meeting said the former Sears internal loading dock was a plus for the project.
"The building has a unique internal loading dock and the trash and biohazard medical removal will occur from that secure loading dock," Winn said. Ambulances also would be able to use the internal space.
Moorestown resident Val Sirani of Highland Avenue asked if Cooper planned to use helicopters to transport patients in case of emergencies. Winn said no helicopters would be used.
Cooper has more than 100 outpatient facilities across South Jersey and in 2021 had more than 1.6 million outpatient visits, Mazarelli said. The total included 49,363 urgent-care visits.
The Pearl apartment complex would be at the southeast corner of the Moorestown Mall property.
