Canadian construction activity is slated to take a step back in 2006 after two years of good growth, according to a new forecast by McGraw-Hill Construction Research & Analytics. The firm predicts that total construction will decline 2% in 2006, to $56.6 billion, after growing 9% in 2004 and 3% this year. The main drag on activity is coming from the residential market. Since 2000 the value of permits filed for residential structures have grown an astonishing 81%. Both single-family and multifamily permits have benefited from low mortgage rates and a healthy economy. However, the party is almost over. Mortgage
Construction companies and rental firms bought tons of iron this year, giving vendors little chance to come up for air. "The good news is that I’m sold out," says one manufacturing executive. "The bad news: I’m sold out." A slower rate of growth next year is expected to bring welcome relief. General equipment will be more available but larger machines will remain in short supply until 2007. "We are in the fourth or fifth inning of the ball game," says Charles Rentschler, an investment analyst with Foresight Research Solutions, Oak Park, Ill. Related Links: A Rebound in Nonresidential Building Markets
History buffs reviewing this year’s batch of industry forecasts for 2006 may experience Yogi Berra’s feeling of "deja vu all over again." The scenario of strong and steady public works and rebounding nonresidential building markets offsetting a downturn in a record-breaking homebuilding market is strikingly similar to last year’s predictions. While last year’s forecasts for public works and nonresidential buildings pretty much came true, the housing market once again defied predictions of its demise. Instead of slowing, the value of new residential construction put-in-place increased 14% this year, according to estimates by the U.S. Dept. of Commerce. New housing will
Related Links: A Rebound in Nonresidential Building Markets Keeps Growth Going FMI�s Forecast Leads the Bulls NAHB Predicts That Higher Interest Rates Will Cool Off Housing PCA Says Inflation Will Be a Problem Markets Will Retrench in 2006 Shortage of Big Machinery Continues Amid Explosive Buying Spree Forecast 2006 The complete Forecast 2006 cover story with all data and analysis is free to ENR subscribers but can also be purchased for only $17.95. click here for more information. The U.S. Dept. of Commerce predicts that the momentum of this year’s markets will carry over into 2006, leading to another 6%
Related Links: A Rebound in Nonresidential Building Markets Keeps Growth Going Commerce Predicts Housing Will Hold On FMI�s Forecast Leads the Bulls PCA Says Inflation Will Be a Problem Markets Will Retrench in 2006 Shortage of Big Machinery Continues Amid Explosive Buying Spree Forecast 2006 The complete Forecast 2006 cover story with all data and analysis is free to ENR subscribers but can also be purchased for only $17.95. click here for more information. Higher interest rates and energy costs will combine in 2006 to knock residential construction from this year’s record peak of 2.05 million starts, according to the
Bromwell was accused of fraud. On April 10, 1999, the Maryland Senate adopted a resolution offering its "sincerest congratulations" to W. David Stoffregen, the former CEO of mechanical contractor Poole and Kent Corp., which that year was acquired by specialty contracting giant Emcor Group. The warm feelings between former Maryland state Senator Thomas L. Bromwell and Stoffregen would soon blossom into a wide-ranging scheme through which Bromwell and his wife Mary, received pay and favors for helping Poole and Kent, prosecutors claim. If the charges are true, Stoffregen has joined a long list of contractors, engineers and architects who have
One top official of a U.S. Justice Dept. regional office, who has long probed and prosecuted construction industry fraud, offers a first-hand account of practices he sees. He has requested anonymity. "It’s pretty clear that the construction industry generates the most business and corruption cases in the U.S. Locally based companies know each other, and if they all get along, they can make more money. It’s a pattern that occurs all over. Related Links: Pressures and Temptations Have Industry Walking A Fine Line Did Ex-CEO Accused of Fraud Have No Fear of Being Caught? Universities Elevate Ethics Education Global Corruption
Whitbeck Most engineers are proficient in numbers and calculations but may be less confident in the inexact world of business ethics. Two university programs are trying to change that. The Online Ethics Center for Engineering & Science, run by Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, and the National Institute for Engineering Ethics (NIEE) at Texas Tech University, Lubbock, help current practitioners and future engineers confront ethical quandaries they might face. The online ethics center, set up in 1995, is more proactive in helping callers with immediate situations. "We have an ethics help line," says Caroline Whitbeck, center director and a school
Ethics are challenged everywhere, it seems. On Oct. 28, a U.S. prosecutor indicted Vice President Dick Cheney’s chief of staff for allegedly lying to a grand jury, which ended a particularly bad week for the Bush administration. But it was also a bad week for other politicians around the U.S., whose proven or suspected ethics lapses also made headlines, if not on the front page. While I. Lewis Libby Jr. apparently got into trouble all by himself, others were aided by construction industry executives who engineered or joined in an array of questionable schemes. On Oct. 27, federal prosecutors indicted
Precise. Nodes for the diagrid (left) and megacolumn-superdiagonal connection had extremely tight tolerances. (Photos courtesy of Cives Steel Co.) It’s an expanded home for the Hearst Corp. media family, not the Hearst family itself. But the Manhattan job may as well be called Hearst Castle East. The builders of the 46-story office building–a restoration, an adaptive reuse and a modern steel tower rolled into one–are as obsessed with quality and detail as was William Randolph Hearst, when he built his extravagant California estate in the early 1900s. The Hearst Building leaves no room for error and has "no forgiveness," says
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