October 19, 2022: the groundbreaking
Indiana University School of Medicine broke ground on its medical education and research building on October 19, 2022. The school put the budget at $230 million. The building was set at 11 stories and 326,200 gross square feet, west of Senate Avenue and south of the IU Neurosciences Research Center on 16th Street. IU Health contributed $145 million of that total.
Browning Day of Indianapolis and Perkins & Will of Chicago designed the building, and the IU Board of Trustees approved the design in February 2022. The 2022 release forecast completion in November 2024. The building opened in June 2025, and medical school classes began on August 4, 2025.
The programme as filed
The ground floor was set to carry an atrium with spaces for small learning communities, classrooms, lecture halls and a cafe. The two floors above were set to carry further classrooms, a surgical skills center, simulation spaces, a library, practice exam rooms and an anatomy lab. Eight floors of research and office space rise above the academic base, and an underground tunnel links the building north to Goodman Hall and the Neuroscience Research Building.
Dave and Susan Roberts committed $10 million for neurodegenerative research inside gifts and commitments the school counts at nearly $15 million. Dr. Diane K. Werth gave $5 million for the anatomy lab.
The contracting base and its window
Two published counts cover the site workforce: about 1,500 construction workers on site on April 1, 2026, and about 2,000 workers on the campus daily with about 3.9 million hours worked as of June 4, 2025, both from Inside INdiana Business.
IBJ published the labour picture for the downtown pipeline on July 14, 2023: at least $9.5 billion in development over the next decade, nearly two dozen projects of $100 million or more in the next five years, and a central Indiana construction labour pool that had grown 48 percent since the 2009 recession to more than 61,000 workers. Colliers International’s Sean Maloy told IBJ the pipeline was stressing the local labour pool, and F.A. Wilhelm president Phil Kenney said the workforce was stretched.
A stretched labour market lengthens schedules, and a schedule sets the window a crew account prices against. The price effect shows on a sister downtown project. IBJ reported the Capital Improvement Board approving up to $70 million more, to $571 million, for the 800-room Signia by Hilton, a 14 percent increase tied almost entirely to labour for electrical, mechanical, plumbing and HVAC trades, per executive director Andy Mallon.
The hospital that changes the account
IU Health is building its downtown hospital complex beside the education building on 44 acres that run from 16th Street to 12th Street and from Capitol Avenue to Interstate 65. The hospital carries 864 inpatient rooms in three 16-story towers, 50 operating rooms, 380 outpatient exam rooms, two helipads and 1 million square feet dedicated to inpatient care.
Construction Dive put the hospital at 2.1 million square feet and traced the budget from an initial $1.6 billion to $2.31 billion in 2023, then to $4.3 billion with the support buildings and infrastructure added. Inside INdiana Business reported the split in June 2025 as $2.3 billion for the hospital and $1.98 billion for additional campus facilities.
Inside INdiana Business reported the complex at about 60 percent complete and on schedule to open in late 2027 as of April 1, 2026. The IU Health project page answers its own opening question with December 2027, and IndyGo’s October 2025 construction notice gives the fourth quarter of 2027. A crew account ends when the build ends, and the hospital account starts when the doors open.
The supply that answers in the same window
The Signia by Hilton Indianapolis carries three published room counts: 803 on the venue expansion page, 800 in the venue’s own April 2026 news item and at Bradford Allen, and 814 in Newmark’s supply table. The venue dates reservations from February 1, 2027, ahead of the hospital opening.
The Indianapolis Convention Center and Lucas Oil Stadium facility guide counts 4,721 rooms connected by skywalk, 7,175 rooms inside a six-block radius and 4,570 committable group rooms downtown. Visit Indy counts 12 hotels and 5,200 rooms connected to the convention center. Those are the seats a sales team can place a campus account into.
What the record does not show
No fetched source names a general contractor or a trade package list for the education building. No publisher has printed a close-out cost, so the $230 million figure stands as the 2022 number. No source gives a date for the simulation center’s opening or a workforce count for the education building alone.
Those questions go to IU School of Medicine and to IU Health, together with a request for the patient-family booking pattern the hospital phase will carry.