Gas leak explosions, like the March 12 blast that leveled two five-story buildings in New York City's East Harlem, are commonplace nationwide and are not always due to aging infrastructure. In fact, experts in and out of industry say significant incidents in U.S. gas distribution pipelines occur on average every four to six days, and excavation work is often to blame for pipeline damage, according to the Pipeline & Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA). Photo By Jeffrey Cox/ENR Investigators are still combing the blast site, where two five-story buildings once stood, for clues. Photo By Jeffrey Cox/ENR Side streets off
The joint venture team of developers Related Companies and Oxford Properties Group broke ground yesterday, March 19, on the $700-million eastern platform over active rail lines on Manhattan's West Side. The platform, part of the massive Hudson Yards redevelopment site, follows the start last December of another project at the site, the 80-story North Tower, 30 Hudson Yards. Rendering Courtesy of Related-Oxford Rising High: The Hudson Yards redevelopment site is expected to take about 10-12 years to complete. The size of the entire mixed-use site grew last year with the addition of 50 and 55 Hudson Yards located between 33rd
Some call it an indication of an all-out recovery while others describe it as just a gradual upswing, but most agree that the dramatic increase in the number of construction cranes in and around metro New York last year is, indeed, a good sign. While many of the megaprojects, especially in transportation, have been a long time in the making, they started up along with numerous high-end residential and mixed-use towers—helping to bolster the region's construction activity and make industry executives more optimistic than they have been in the last few years. Related Links: 2013 Top Starts Ranking Top Starts
Thornton Tomasetti, New York, has promoted Gemini Nazareno to vice president. Nazareno has more than 25 years of experience in plumbing and fire suppression/protection engineering and is a member of the firm's mechanical, electrical and Nazarenoplumbing team. Nazareno previously worked for five years in the firm's Newark office as a senior associate and project manager. Related Links: ENR New York ENR New York Featured People The Building Trades Employers' Association (BTEA) has elected its 2014 co-chairmen. They are Charles Avolio, vice president and operations manager of Turner Construction Co., and Michael Russo, CEO and corporate secretary of Fresh Meadows Mechanical
Photo By Sue Pearsall Safety First: DOB credits its enforcement and industry outreach on safety for the decline in worksite fatalities. Photo Courtesy of Several Seconds/Flickr, Licensed Under CC By-NC-ND 2.0 Out With the Old, In With the New: The long-overdue repair and modernization of existing infrastructure in New York City would cost about $47 billion, according to a recent study. Related Links: ENR New York Featured News News Wrap Feb. 24, 2014 New York Worker Deaths Decline, But Injuries IncreaseConstruction-related fatalities in New York City dropped last year, but the number of accidents and injuries rose, says Thomas
When Brookfield Office Properties unveiled plans to develop a long dormant site on Manhattan's West Side last year, it would have been fair to question whether the global firm would complete the $4.6-billion project.
The ongoing shift to bring health care services to the masses wherever they live has helped to ignite demand for new construction of ambulatory care centers nationwide. Even old, established institutions including the University of Pennsylvania Health System (UPHS)—which includes the 263-year-old Pennsylvania Hospital—are heavily investing in outpatient satellite centers. The trend, one of several affecting the hospital and health care sector, calls for project teams that can remain as flexible with demand, schedules and costs as their clients, said speakers at ENR New York’s The Future of Healthcare Construction conference, held Feb. 26, in New York.While institutions remain committed
It took several months after Superstorm Sandy's devastating blow for the hardest-hit New York and New Jersey shorelines to become usable by the public again as tons of debris were removed and emergency repairs were made. The October 2012 storm robbed significant amounts of sand from beaches, destroyed or severely compromised berms and dunes and increased flood risks to local communities. But a new phase of post-Sandy work to make the shores more resilient to storms will begin as early as this fall and focus on roughly $2.77 billion worth of projects in the region that were federally authorized before
Superstorm Sandy's effect on many of the beaches of the East Coast was like a knife on burnt toast—scraping and scraping away, until, in some places, not much was left but rocks. But in a widespread and intensive effort that began last summer, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and its contractors began replenishing beaches and undoing years of erosion, work that is expected to continue through most of this year. The aim is to restore beaches to their original construction state. Related Links: Engineering News Record Architectural Record "People who go to the beach will notice a big difference
Peter Gisolfi Associates, Architects, Landscape Architects LLP, Hastings-on-Hudson, N.Y., has named Diane Abate associate. She joins fellow associates Klaus Kalmbach, Andy Rong-Hui Lin and Ronen Wilk. Abate's role involves master-plan and conceptual design development. She also will coordinate construction document preparation and all aspects of construction administration. Abate Related Links: ENR New York ENR New York Featured People Thornton Tomasetti, New York, has hired Tom Byrne as a business development senior associate. Byrne, who has more than 15 years of experience in the building engineering industry, will collaborate on national and international business development efforts.WSP USA, New York, has hired
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