The overall U.S. construction market has been turning around for the past year and a half, and large corporate owners are beginning to open up their checkbooks again and slowly ramp up their capital programs. But some of the large owners share the same worries as construction firms about the future of the construction industry and how it will impact their programs in the long term. What the major corporate owners want is no secret. "I hear it every day from my bosses: They want their projects better, faster and cheaper," says Les Sturgeon, divisional vice president for Abbott Nutritionals
Enlarge + Under the river and through the city will go Sacramento Regional County Sanitation District’s (SRCSD) $600-million Lower Northwest Interceptor (LNWI), a 19-mile pipeline being built with the aid of more than 22 contractors and subcontractors using some of the most sophisticated digging equipment on the planet. The pipeline, which will serve the fast-growing Natomas and West Sacramento areas. SRCSD parceled out the work to assure competition and contracting capacity. Tasks are spread among nine projects, including two new pump stations, five pipeline projects and 14 tunneled crossings–two under the Sacramento River. During peak wet weather flows, the system
Talk is cheap–and powerfully interconnected, geographically indifferent, resource-filled, data-enriched and inexpensively managed by in-house staff when company phone systems fling voices across the Internet, rather than over traditional networks most use today. The enabling technology is called Voice over Internet Protocol, or VoIP. It is an early wave in a sea of new Internet-enabled business tools on the way. But VoIP already is widely available, and early adopters say it’s a great fit for the construction industry. With VoIP, phone calls are transmitted over the Internet for a fraction of current costs. But ultimately calls reach any phone as if
Periodic flooding of Kuala Lumpur’s commercial center has dampened Malaysia’s ambitions for its capital to become a major international city. But by building a 9.7-kilometer- long water diversion tunnel, and putting a two-deck highway inside, local contractors are working to alleviate monsoon floods while showing a talent for novel engineering and smart financing. Click here to view map Tough Cut. Tricky ground conditions required slurry-pressure TBMs. (Photo courtesy of SMART JV) Included as an afterthought, the unprecedented 3-km-long contractor-financed highway component is subsid-izing the $525-million Stormwater Management and Road Tunnel (SMART) project, bringing it within the government’s means. On two
The complete Top 500 Designers list with revenue and market data is free to ENR subscribers but can also be purchased for only $14.95 Want the entire Top 500 Design Firms list, with a special supplement showing subsidiaries and what countries the Top 500 work in, in an electronic format? Click here for more information. click here to view firm rankings>> For large design firms, the construction market finally began to break out of recession in 2004 after three tough years. Among executives of many top firms, there is a growing sense of optimism that business is picking up and
When Mark Brewer joined Miami-based engineer PBS&J three years ago as director of organizational development, "there was no training here," he says. "Now we’re coordinating all of it." The firm is among a growing number in design and construction that now are elevating company training, employee development and "adult learning" into a top corporate priority. Some have even chosen to call their effort the company "university" and promote its connection to the corporate culture. "From day one, employees know we’re here," says Mary Leslie, corporate university director at CDM, the Cambridge, Mass.-based engineer. "We’re as much a part of day-to-day
Standing in the rain on Feb. 19 to witness the slow-motion roof lift for the $450-million Arizona Cardinals Stadium development was about as exciting as watching the grass grow. That was just fine with the "gardeners." They had toiled, some for five years, on this unusual roof-raising. And they were thrilled that the superficial tedium of the maximum 20-ft-per-hour lift was not shattered during the 120-ft lift and positioning of the 5,400-ton mega-assembly, which was jacked up in slots in its corner supercolumns. Popped Up. Roof, preassembled on the field and lifted, appeared on the landscape late last month. Bad
...combination of Alucobond composite panels and a lighter-weight foam panel. Scenic elements, such as hatches, watertight doors, lifeboats, bits and chocks are either replicated or salvaged from decommissioned ships. Few projects have integrated this degree of high-tech pyrotechnics and special effects. “We have multiple roles,” says Hilde A. Varah, GlobalSim program manager. “We do the computerized training management system, which scores and tracks recruits. Then we handle the closed-circuit safety TV system to monitor potential problem areas. Then we manage the recruit phone communication network. Later, we took on the system integration effort to provide a communication platform, data base
On the beam. Interstate�s facilities were modern. At least 8,000 tons of steel sit silently on a trailer and on the ground in a yard in central New Jersey. While some of it is raw and some fabricated, each piece is marked with the number 2402 and was set to frame the structure of a soaring new midtown Manhattan headquarters for The New York Times Co., estimated at $350 million. Now, the steel is going nowhere, the subject of a bitter legal contest between project prime contractor AMEC Construction Management Inc., a trustee liquidating the assets of the job’s main
Meatballs, deer and insects may sound like lunch gone awry, but they may also bring to mind the logos of some well-known construction equipment suppliers. For years, images of the red-hot Manitowoc meatball, the leaping John Deere and the determined Caterpillar have turned up on countless hard hats and purchase orders, burrowing into the minds of engineers, estimators and superintendents. "Suppliers have to convince me they will be around tomorrow." — Thad Pirtle, VP of equipment management, Traylor Bros. Inc., Evansville, Ind. "Manufacturers are getting close on quality." — J. Pat Monnot, VP of Global Operations, AMECO, Greenville, S.C. But
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