Former honeymoon hotel site to be new LVH-Pocono site

Summit Health Campus, as it is called, was originally proposed as Pocono Medical Center West by the former Pocono Medical Center before it merged with LVHN. The status of those plans was unclear after Pocono merged with Lehigh Valley on Jan. 1 and became Lehigh Valley Hospital-Pocono.

Brian Nestor, president and CEO of LVHN, said at the time of the merger that the 48-bed acute care hospital was still under consideration. The site is on Route 715 near its junction with Interstate 80.

The proposal calls for the construction of a 48-bed acute care community hospital – that could expand to 72 beds – and a 36,000-square foot medical building that would be leased. There is plenty of room for even further development.

Monday, the Pocono Township Planning Commission recommended Summit Health Campus’ plan size and stormwater modifications be recommended for approval by the township commissioners.

Brian Downs, a spokesman for LVHN, declined to confirm plans to build a hospital and medical building at the location.

“We are in the planning stages,” Downs said this morning. “There will be something there and that is being determined.”

The Summit Hotel, which closed in 2002, is easily visible from I-80. The site is several miles north of the recently opened St. Luke’s Monroe hospital, which is on Route 611 in Bartonsville.

DF Pocono Associates, a partnership of Legend Properties in Plymouth Meeting and Farda Realty Associates in Tannersville, which owns the Summit Hotel land, also plans additional commercial and residential development on Route 715, according to a news report.

DF Pocono plans to build a hotel, retail, restaurants and a professional building on 20 acres on the northwest side of Route 715 across from the proposed LVHN hospital and medical building, and a retail and multifamily development on 20 acres near Northampton Community College’s Monroe Campus on Route 715 in Tannersville.

A call to Legend Properties was not returned.