Along the National Mall in Washington, D.C., memorials honor the service of Americans in wartime, but the site’s newest addition will be one that fosters conflict resolution and peace. The 150,000-sq-ft permanent headquarters for the U.S. Institute of Peace, being built at the mall’s northwest corner near the Lincoln Memorial and the Theodore Roosevelt Bridge over the Potomac river, will greet visitors with a dramatic new structure that its designers say both respects the context of its historic surroundings and offers a strikingly modern contrast. Slide Show Photo: The U.S. Institute of Peace. The 150,000-sq-ft U. S. Institute of Peace,
In an unusual move in the highly commercialized sports market, the city council of Irving, Texas, voted on Dec. 31 to award naming rights to the demolition of Texas Stadium to Kraft Foods Global. The city council says the partnership, nicknamed “The Cheddar Explosion,” will yield $1 million in promotional value for the city. Kraft agreed to pay $75,000 for the naming rights and provide an additional $75,000 in products to local food banks. Weir Bros. Inc., a Dallas-based contractor, received a notice to proceed on the demolition project on Oct. 20, 2009. The implosion of the stadium is tentatively
The developer of the world’s tallest building, which opened on Jan. 4 in Dubai after more than a year’s delay, has announced the height at 828 meters. The announcement ends years of speculation, fueled by developer Emaar Properties. Members of the design and construction team, including architect-engineer Skidmore, Owings & Merrill and lead contractor Samsung Corp., were contractually obligated to keep the height a secret. The 828-m height makes the building 320 m taller than the previous world’s tallest building, the 508-m Taipei 101. The difference is equivalent to an 80-story-plus tower. The Burj Khalifa, which is the Burj Dubai’s
The developer of the world's tallest building, which finally opened Jan. 4 in Dubai after more than a year's delay, has announced the height at 828 meters. The announcement ends years of speculation, fueled by developer Emaar Properties. Members of the design and construction team, including architect-engineer Skidmore, Owings & Merrill and lead contractor Samsung Corp., were contractually obligated to keep the height a secret. Emaar Properties Burj Dubai opens under its new name, Burj Khalifa The 828-m height makes the building a whopping 320 m taller than the previous world's tallest building, the 508-m Taipei 101. The difference is
Though work is expected to resume in about five weeks, the Dec. 24 collapse of a 50-meter-long portion of an unfinished, 1,100-m-long cable-stayed bridge, some 50 m above the river Chambal near Kota in Rajasthan, has left the National Highway Authority of India baffled. The accident killed more than 45 people. Many others still are missing. Crews are removing more than 8,000 tonnes of concrete that fell, killing more than 45 people. The $65-million project, 310 miles from New Delhi, consists of a 700-m-long cable-stayed structure with a 350-m main span and an access viaduct on either end. Hyundai Engineering
A construction consortium from Spain, Mexico and Costa Rica has outbid three other competitors for the second-largest contract awarded in the Panama Canal’s $5.2-billion Third Lane Expansion effort, eclipsed only by the price tag for design and construction of the waterway’s new locks. Photo: Panama Canal Authority Dam Structure (center in green) will be built due to water level differences in new channel, which is part of the canal expansion. Fomento de Construcciones y Contratas S.A., along with Mexico’s Empresas ICA and Constructora MECO of Costa Rica, submitted a bid of $268 million for the fourth and final contract to
Wind-energy developers are working with the state of Hawaii and Hawaii’s largest electric utility to develop wind resources on two islands and deliver power to Oahu. One estimate pegs the program’s cost at $3 billion, but another source says it could cost twice that amount. + Image Photo: Illustration by Martha Hernandez, Courtesy of The Honolulu Advertiser Interisland Wind Project: University of Hawaii performed a sea-floor survey and feasibility study for the state to identify routes and possible obstacles for cable. The Interisland Wind Project encompasses two 200-MW wind farms to be developed on the islands of Lanai and Molokai,
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency on Dec. 29 sent a letter to the District of Columbia and six states in the Chesapeake Bay watershed and outlining new penalties if they do not meet more stringent requirements for cleaning up water pollution. Bay advocates have criticized federal and state efforts to clean up the bay in the past because although states have been encouraged to meet certain milestones in reducing water pollution from point and non-point sources, they typically have faced no penalties for failing to do so—until now. Penalties could include expanding National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) permits to
The U.S. Energy Dept. announced on Dec. 28 a plan to treat thousands of cubic yards of radioactive waste at the Idaho National Laboratory site in Idaho Falls, beating a court-ordered deadline by four days. The practice of reprocessing spent nuclear fuel produced about 9 million gallons of high-level liquid waste at the site over a 40-year span. DOE halted reprocessing in 1992, converting liquid waste into 5,750 cu yd of a powdered material called calcine, which it must now dispose of outside the state. The agency says it intends to convert the powder into a ceramic-like solid through a
On Dec. 16, MGM Mirage’s $8.5-billion, 18-million-sq-ft. CityCenter project debuted on the Las Vegas Strip. Perini Building Co., a unit of Sylmar, Calif.-based Tutor Perini Corp., was the general contractor, with Gensler, San Francisco, as executive architect. The seven-building, mixed-use development on 67 acres at one time employed one-third of southern Nevada’s building trades. The hotel, home and entertainment complex could resurrect or sink Las Vegas’ flagging tourism industry, possibly giving new life to stalled projects, say some observers. If unsuccessful, it could plunge MGM Mirage into financial trouble and slow southern Nevada’s economic recovery. Photo: MGM Mirage Inc.