Even while gaining book smarts—a civil engineering degree from MIT and an MBA from Stanford University—Thomas W. Traylor stayed close to the core of his family-owned contractor, Traylor Bros. Inc., working summers in its welding shop building tunnel shields and the firm’s first rotary tunnel excavator, says one biography.
Graph courtesy of FMI Trends and estimates of total construction put-in-place in the U.S. Related Links: ENR People on the Move Total Construction put-in-place for 2013 will rise 8% over last year to $918.9 billion, says industry management consultant FMI in its first-quarter outlook released last month. The firm says the estimate "is a solid improvement," but it doesn't expect the annual total to reach above the trillion-dollar mark until 2015. The residential sector appears to lead the charge, with single-family buildings set to rise 23% and multifamily construction up 31%, on top of last year's 47% increase. Lodging construction
Photo by Mick Hillier, Ironworkers' Local 25, for ENR Katrina Kudzia, a union ironworker on Detroit's $300-million Cobo Center renovation, focuses on a welding task 50 ft up in constructing the facility's signature atrium. Related Links: Main Feature: Industry Women Weigh In on the New Normal Tradeswomen Are Urged to 'Lean In' at Big California Gathering Cobo Center (Detroit) renovation project Ironworkers' Union website At 6:45 a.m. in a dingy worker break room in Detroit's massive Cobo Center, Katrina Kudzia starts her transformation into a "bad ass" union ironworker, grabbing her welder's helmet and tucking her scarf-wrapped long hair into
Related Links: New Bid Protests Halt Contract Execution on Corps Flood Job Two years after its first attempt to award what will be the last major contract in New Orleans for post-Katrina storm surge defenses, the Army Corps of Engineers again selected joint venture PCCP Constructors.Bid protests, related legal challenges and reprocurements—as well as changed contract prices, specifications and terms—have kept the project in limbo since April 2011.Losing bidders to the current contract are CBY Design-Builders, a CDM-led venture, and Bechtel Infrastructure Corp. Those teams and PCCP Constructors were also involved in previous contract bids and bid protests.Spokeswomen for the
Photo by Bob Vale Engineering student (left) and a contractor tour guide interact in East Side Access rail tunnel; more than 425 students toured the project on a Moles-sponsored tour on April 12. Related Links: Learn About Moles Education Programs at Redesigned Website! MTA Capital Programs-East Side Access ENR New York/MTA a Decade Late, $4.4B Over Budget on East Side Access Project Those who build civil works underground aren't seen much by the public or by the industry's next generation. But this was not the case on April 12, when hundreds of engineering and construction college juniors and their contractor
Image Courtesy of Maser Consulting Firm's use of surveying technology allows close monitoring of rail alignment on rail construction project below Grand Central station to detect shifts that could affect commuter safety. Related Links: The Top 500 Design Firms At No. 214 on ENR's list of the Top 500 Design Firms, Maser Consulting P.A., Red Bank, N.J., is embracing new technology to maintain a leadership role in land surveying, its biggest niche, and to boost its edge in newer telecommunications and transportation markets.The firm oversees deployment of Amberg Technologies' trolley-based survey system to measure track alignment on New York City
Related Links: With Engineering Savvy, Abreu Pilots Airport Plan In a planned succession, Black & Veatch has elevated Steve L. Edwards to chairman, president and CEO, effective in January. Named immediately to what the firm tells ENR is a first-time company role as chief operating officer, he will succeed Leonard C. Rodman, who has been president and CEO since 1998 and chairman since 2000. Edwards, who had been executive vice president, also is executive director of global EPC for the Overland Park, Kan., firm's global energy business. Rodman, 64, who the company says will retire in 2014, is a 42-year
Despite recent slowdowns and cancellations of mining projects, particularly in Australia, Omaha-based engineer HDR remains optimistic that growth in the sector could boost stalled global economies.
Related Links: Birdsall Services Group website NJ Attorney General's announcement on design firm indictments In an April 1 ruling, a U.S. bankruptcy judge in New Jersey is allowing Eatontown, N.J., engineer Birdsall Services Group to access $1.7 million of state-seized assets for operation and payroll, following the state's March 26 indictments of the firm and seven former executives.They are charged with conspiracy and money-laundering in a six-year system of making large donations to public officials in both parties through small reimbursed employee outlays, says the indictment.Despite state objections, Judge Michael Kaplan agreed that shutdown of the firm, which filed for
Related Links: Senior Moments: Are Older Workers at Greater Risk of Injury? Fred Dryden operates an excavator for the heavy division of Barletta Cos.' reconstruction of the 97-year-old Larz Anderson Bridge near Harvard Square in Cambridge, Mass. At 60, there is a good chance he's older than some of Boston's infrastructure. As an operating engineer, he has managed to avoid many of the physical hazards to which other construction crafts are prone and plans to stay on the job until age 65."I like my work because I'm always doing something different," he says with a smile. "I've got wheels, so