Top hot building markets for AEC firms in 2008 include healthcare, higher education, K-12 schools and commercial office buildings, according to the Building Design+Construction chief economist and ZweigWhite, a leading management consulting firm for the industry. Highway and bridge construction also will be strong in 2008.

The economists also reported that the cost of building materials and construction wages were up in the last months of 2007, factors that could affect project costs. Labor and materials also are in relatively tight supply.

Source: Building Design+Construction 

Dave Dwars of the Lawrence Group was quoted in a Midwest Construction cover story on redevelopment of downtown St. Louis this month.

According to the article, 69 buildings have been restored downtown since 1999, totaling $1.3 billion in development.

An example is the Lawrence Group’s $125 million Park Pacific Building. Renovation of the 22-story, 470-sq-ft former Missouri Pacific/Union Pacific building, originally constructed in 1928, will include 108 condos, 50 apartments, 51,000 sq ft of office space and another 10,000 sq ft of space for street-level retail.

Another $1 billion in projects is in the pipeline with 26 buildings being restored or under development.

Other facts:

• 10,000 people live downtown of which 5,000 are new, according to the Downtown St. Louis Partnership.
• About 1,200 additional residents are expected to move in over the next three years.
• 2,700 new housing units opened downtown in the past two years.
• Downtown currently has more than 7,400 rental and sale units.

Walton Construction St. Louis operations manager Tom Kaiman of Chesterfield, Missouri has been chosen as one of 40 young professionals nationwide to receive the Building Design+Construction’s third annual “40 Under 40” award.

The honor is bestowed to young professionals in the design and construction industry. The editors described the winners as the “next generation of leadership.”

Currently, Kaiman supervises a 40-person team working on 11 projects in three states with a total construction value of more than $100 million. Kaiman is responsible for overseeing design, estimating and budgeting, construction operations and startup.

Kaiman’s early background as an AHL professional hockey player gave him special expertise to work on the $18.5 million St. Peters Rec-Plex Renovation and Expansion project in St. Peters, Missouri, which opened in November 2007. He also worked on the $6 million St. Louis Blues Ice Hockey Practice Facility in Hazelwood, Missouri.

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An article this week in the New York Times (January 27) reports that more than 800 buildings nationwide are lined up for LEED-EB certification, following the release of streamlined LEED-EB guidelines last October.

LEED-EB, which stands for LEED for Existing Buildings, is a three-year-old program by the U.S. Green Building Council that provides steps building owners and managers can take to operate and manage their properties more efficiently. Like LEED for new buildings, the program assigns points for efforts like recycling and indoor air quality, and offers four levels of certification.
According to the Green Building Council, more than 60 buildings, including the Adobe Towers in San Jose, Calif., the Discovery Channel headquarters in Silver Spring, Md., and the Merchandise Mart in Chicago, already have received LEED-EB  certifications, and 840 more are in the process of doing so, representing more than a half-billion square feet of space.

Source: New York Times

Architectural billings showed a healthy score in December, according to the Architecture Billings Index (ABI) reported by the American Institute of Architects this week. The index shows a nine to twelve month lag time between architectural billings and construction spending, so it’s a good outlook indicator for construction.
The December ABI was up a fraction to 55.4, from 55.3 in November, marking the 34th straight month with a positive score. That’s the longest run in the history of the survey, which began in 1995.

Source: Building Design+Construction 

The Portland Cement Association predicts that portland cement consumption will be down until at least 2010, as the depressed housing market affects consumer spending and commercial construction.

In the long term, though, cement use is expected to grow by 43% to 183-million tonness by 2030, 55-million tonness more than 2005. Highway construction, which accounts for 30% of total annual cement consumption, is expected to add 400,000 new roadway miles by 2030. And if “green” building continues to grow, energy efficient insulated concrete walls could account for 30% of all new homes, up from 7% today. That growth alone could use an additional eight million metric tons of cement.

Source: ENR