Photo courtesy of JSW Severfield Structures Ltd The tower's splayed legs help reduce vibrations caused by the wind. At a height of 274.9 ft, a new air traffic control tower for Chhatrapati Shivaji International Airport in Mumbai is India's tallest control tower. The high-tech structure, intended as an architectural icon and symbol of India's advancement, currently ranks as the fourth tallest control tower in the world.Next year, when a 446-ft-tall tower under construction in Jeddah opens, the $16-million Mumbai tower will fall to fifth place in the ranking. The current tallest is the 361-ft tower at Cairo's airport, according to
Related Links: Chicago DOT Replaces Wells Street Bridge Section in Tight Time Frame Chicago's Red Line Is Getting a $1B, Three-Year Makeover The city of Chicago is launching a $492-million, four-year program to overhaul a mass-transit line that extends between downtown and O'Hare International Airport.Beginning in 2014, the Chicago Transit Authority's (CTA) Blue Line will undergo extensive track improvements, in addition to signal, power and station-house upgrades. Rather than complete track replacement, plans call for renovations along the 12.5-mile line, which includes subway tunnels, elevated structures and ground-level track.Though schedules aren't final, CTA expects to begin with track work, followed
Related Links: New York Commuter Derailment Highlights Lack of Positive Train Control Investment L.A. Commuter Rail Line to Roll Out First Positive Train Control System in U.S. A fatal New York train derailment on Dec. 1 on a Metro-North Railroad commuter train, which appears to be the result of a lapse in the solo engineer's consciousness, has politicians demanding comprehensive, industry-wide implementation of positive train controls (PTC)—a step advocated by the National Transportation Safety Board for decades and one the rail industry already has been struggling to achieve.In a Dec. 4 statement, American Public Transportation Association (APTA) President Michael Melaniphy
Airport authority will expand key international terminal, projecting rise in overseas travelers, particularly to and from Europe. The Israel Airports Authority has issued an international tender for a fourth concourse at the country’s main international airport in order to accommodate growing passenger traffic.The cost of the new addition at Ben Gurion International Airport, outside of Tel Aviv, is estimated at $190 million. IAA expects to decide on the winning bidder by mid-2014. The timetable calls for completion of the project at Terminal 3, the airport's main international hub, within three years.The terminal, which opened in 2004, was designed by Skidmore,
Related Links: California Bay Delta Plan Undergoes More Changes Review the Full Bay Delta Conservation Plan After years of planning, the state of California released the latest version of its controversial Bay Delta Conservation Plan on Dec. 9. Encompassing the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, which drains about half the land mass of the state, the $24.75-billion plan aims to balance the goals of helping 56 species of plants and animals to recover while stabilizing Delta water deliveries to agricultural and municipal users.The plan's centerpiece includes $16 billion for three new water intakes outfitted with fish-protection screens at the delta's north end;
ENR/Dodge Residential building shows strong uptick. ENR/Dodge November shows positive momentum. Related Links: Engineering News-Record Architectural Record Economics Construction starts are ending the year with a strong upturn, according to McGraw Hill Construction's Dodge.The seasonally adjusted rate for the Dodge starts last October was up 5% from the previous month.On a year-to-date basis, the dollar value of total construction starts through October was $433 billion, up 4% from the same period a year ago.Most of the increase came from a 26% year-to-year jump in residential construction, which totaled $174 billion during the first 10 months of the year. But non-residential
Related Links: India Blackout Affects 600 Million People India Blackout Highlights Gap Between Power Supply and Demand Hindustan Construction Co. home page National Hydroelectric Power Corp. home page Construction World To bolster India’s northern power grid, Hindustan Construction Co. (HCC) is constructing the 240-MW Uri-II hydro development power project. The project is a run-of-the-river scheme for the National Hydroelectric Power Corp. (NHPC) on the Jhelum River in the Uri area of the Baramullah district in northern Kashmir. Generating electricity from four 60-MW turbines, Uri-II will not only make the state independent in terms of power but also lend power to
Courtesy WSDOT Operators monitor progress from Bertha's control room. Courtesy WSDOT Largest TBM in North America, measuring 57.5 ft in dia, is temporarily stuck along its 1.7-mile underground course. Related Links: Big Tunneler Headed For New State Route 99 Site People Dig Tunnel Boring Machines That Tweet Joint-venture contractor Seattle Tunnel Partners needs divers to enter the chamber behind a tunnel-boring machine’s cutting head to investigate what possibly slowed—and subsequently forced a shutdown of—North America’s largest TBM, nicknamed "Bertha." The 57.5-ft-dia TBM is attempting to bore a 1.7-mile Alaskan Way Viaduct replacement under downtown Seattle. On Friday, Dec. 6, Bertha, which
Related Links: Announcement: Ontario Releases Long-Term Energy Plan Ontario will defer indefinitely construction of two new nuclear-power reactors at the Darlington and Bruce Power facilities, scale back plans to refurbish operating units at those sites and may order the shutdown of another six-unit plant before its scheduled 2020 closing date, according to a long-term energy plan the provincial government released earlier this month.The province said that advances in energy conservation, enhanced efficiency and a slowdown in electricity-demand growth prompted it to revise a 2010 energy plan that called for building the two new reactors at the Darlington powerplant site as
Related Links: LA Commuter Rail Line To Roll Out First Positive Train Control System In U.S. Service To Be Restored To Hudson Line On Wednesday Rail infrastructure damage appears to be a result—not a cause—of the Dec. 1 commuter train derailment that killed four and injured many more.Just days before the first four of seven Metro-North Railroad railcars went off the tracks on a curve by the Hudson River, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority had announced a contract with a joint venture of Siemens Rail Automation and Bombardier Transportation Rail Control Solutions to implement positive train control (PTC) that might have
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