SAVANNAH, Ga. (WSAV) – Savannah city leaders announced plans to open a new COVID-19 vaccination site on the Southside.

The announcement was made during a news conference Tuesday morning at Georgia Southern University’s Armstrong (GS) Center Atrium.

The new site was made possible because of a partnership between GS, Gulfstream, SouthCoast Health, Hospice Savannah, Healthy Savannah, United Way of the Coastal Empire and the city of Savannah.

“The ability to collaborate will not only serve our students here at Georgia Southern Armstrong campus and our faculty and our staff, but also the entirety of the community and for us, that’s works critically important,” said GS President Dr. Kyle Marerro.

“We need to put this pandemic behind us, we need to get back to a sense of normalcy and we will only do that when we get vaccinated,” said John Marerro, the CEO of SouthCoast Health, the company working with the Georgia Department of Health to administer vaccines at the new site.

For now, he says the site will offer the Moderna vaccine.

Residents can set up appointments at covidvaxdial311.com. The vaccination will be open on Tuesdays and Thursdays from 9 a.m. – 4 p.m.

Once operational, Armstrong’s site will become the third COVID-19 mass vaccination site in Chatham County. The other two sites are at Gulfstream in West Chatham County and the Savannah Civic Center.

Watch Tuesday’s full press conference:

Savannah Mayor Van Johnson touts the new site’s location for its proximity to public transportation and a previously untapped portion of the Savannah community.

“Also, if you notice, there’s a bunch of retail on Abercorn,” he said. “So people can go join after lunchtime comes, so I think this may be the ideal site.”

The new site was announced in conjunction with a new campaign titled “Know the facts + Get your vax.”

Chatham County Commissioner Chairman Chester Ellis says until more people get vaccinated, restrictions will stay in place.

“The quicker we could get all Chatham County vaccinated, then we can talk about relaxing some of the rules and regulations, but until that time, the mask requirement was going to stay in place,” he said.

Starting Wednesday, Chatham County residents can call 311 for help scheduling a vaccine appointment or arranging free transportation to a site.