WELCOME TO OUR NEW WEBSITE!
It's our hope that this new website will help inform our members and signatory contractors as to the benefits provided by the Laborers' District Council Labor-Management Cooperation Committee.
The Labor - Management Cooperation Committee was formed on June 1, 2001 and serves the following Illinois counties:
BOONE - COOK - DuPAGE - GRUNDY - KANE - KENDALL - LAKE - McHENRY - WILL
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A planned two-mile relocation of Chicago's South Shore Drive, about 10 miles south of the city's downtown, is spurring a $4-billion megaproject to turn the vacant 530-acre site of a former U.S. Steel mill on Lake Michigan into a new community with nearly 14,000 housing units.
Stantec says that it has signed a letter of intent to acquire Anshen + Allen, one of North America's leading health care architectural firms with more than 200 employees and offices in San Francisco, Columbus, Boston and London.
Ian P. Tyler, a chartered accountant who now runs London-based contractor Balfour Beatty plc, admits to “never being good” at the accounting business.
Virginia Tech architecture student Christopher Morgan has won an international competition to design the Yéle Music Studio in the Cité Soleil area of Port-au-Prince.
To many architects, Louis Kahn’s 1955 Trenton Bath House in Ewing, New Jersey, just restored by Farewell Mills Gatsch Architects (FMG), exudes everything that worked in 20th-century architecture.
Construction workplace deaths continued to decline in 2009, but the fatality rate held even with the previous year’s mark, and industry safety specialists see little sign that conditions are improving on project sites nationwide.
The Empire State Building's owner has lost his bid to stop a new skyscraper from rising in the neighborhood.
It's finally official: After months of speculation, Eli Broad announced that Diller Scofidio + Renfro will design his Broad Collection museum on Grant Avenue in Los Angeles.
This October, the Munson-Williams-Proctor Arts Institute’s Museum of Art (MWPAI) in Utica, New York, will celebrate the 50th anniversary of its Philip Johnson-designed home with an exhibition commemorating the work of the illustrious Modernist and Postmodernist architect.
United Rentals Inc. and Fluor Corp. are teaming up to offer equipment, tools and logistics services for oil-and-gas owners along the Gulf Coast. Executives say the venture may later expand beyond the region.
Companies working on the $670-million Mississippi River Bridge in St. Louis have shattered geotechnical records with a 36,067-ton load test on one of the bridge's drilled-shaft, concrete foundations.
The reuse of buildings is often touted as an environmental benefit, but solid, up-to-date data to support that idea is scarce.
Starting next month, California’s state capital campus, a complex of 23 buildings encompassing 5.5 million sq ft, will be cooled by water chilled in a 4.25-million-gal thermal-energy storage tank.
A three-year-long federal investigation of alleged overbilling on reconstruction contracts in Afghanistan by engineer Louis Berger Group appears likely to force Derish M. Wolff, chairman of the firm’s holding company, from his job, according to court documents filed last week.
After nearly six years of planning, community participation and lengthy hearings, the 2,200 apartment New Domino, with 660 affordable units, received final approval from the City Council last week.
Wind energy, which accounted for 39% of all new U.S. electric generating capacity last year, could provide 20% of the nation’s electricity by 2030 if growth trends continue for wind power installations, according to a recent study.
Prior to California Transportation Commission allocation meetings this week, Caltrans sent a “White Paper” to Dale Bonner, secretary of the state Business, Transportation and Housing Agency, which oversees the department, outlining drastic measures the department will have to make if the state budget is not passed – and passed quickly.
The federally-established regional planning commission for seven counties around Chicago has unveiled its 30-year plan for developing the region.
Caterpillar Inc. has compiled a short list of companies that are in the running to be chosen as the general contractor for its planned $426 million manufacturing plant in Forsyth County. But as many feared, none of them is local.
Plans for the redevelopment and expansion of Delta Air Lines Terminal 4 at New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport have been unveiled after being approved by the Port Authority of New York & New Jersey last week.
The value of new construction starts in July advanced 7% to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of $411.2 billion, according to McGraw-Hill Construction, a division of The McGraw-Hill Companies.
Employers soon will be held to a higher level of accountability regarding construction cranes.
A plan to enlarge the only surviving synagogue by Louis Kahn has sparked opposition among some preservationists, who call the alterations insensitive.
With the news that Facebook had surpassed 500 million users, the social networking website has decided to more than double the size of its first wholly-owned data center currently under construction in Prineville, Ore.
A U.S. contractor managing more than $1 billion in reconstruction contracts in Afghanistan faces federal criminal and civil investigations of claims that it overcharged the government for work, according to federal court documents.
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has released the Sustainable Design and Green Building Toolkit for Local Governments, which offers a guided assessment of codes and ordinances as they relate to green building practices.
Rigger William Rapetti was acquitted in July of all criminal charges against him in connection with the deadly collapse of a tower crane in New York City on March 15, 2008. However, with both of his licenses taken away, he says it has been difficult "to get my life back."
Construction is scheduled to begin this fall on a center conceived by the late Senator Edward Kennedy to teach students about the inner workings of government.
The general contractor on the Connecticut powerplant project that suffered a fatal explosion in February says it plans to contest $8.3 million in federal penalties proposed on Aug. 5 for safety violations. O&G Industries Inc., Torrington, Conn., was one of 17 site contractors fined a total of $16.6 million by the U.S. Labor Dept.'s Occupational Safety and Health Administration for 371 alleged violations related to the blast at the 620-MW Kleen Energy LLC combined-cycle plant in Middletown. Six workers were killed; 50 were injured.
The Savannah College of Art and Design (SCAD), which has a notable track record in historic preservation, has picked a like-minded designer to head its architecture program.
Turner Construction Co., New York City, is looking to put $333 million back on its books after it won a bid protest regarding a new 745,000-sq-ft hospital planned for Fort Benning, Ga.
New construction starts in June dropped 3% to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of $385.7 billion, according to McGraw-Hill Construction, a division of The McGraw-Hill Companies.
Global design giant AECOM Technology Corp., Los Angeles, and leading New York City-based building construction manager Tishman Construction Corp. are linking up to share needed capabilities in a changing construction market.
The capping stack was tested at Cameron Elastomer Technology’s facility in Berwick, Lou., where it has been assembled over the past two months. The stack was installed July 12 and will potentially stop oil from gushing into the gulf.
As campuses prep for the fall semester, some top architecture schools are experiencing turnovers among their high-level staff.
Virginia’s 14-mile Interstate 495 expansion will take just four years, thanks to design-build and an infusion of private capital
“Bad architecture is in the end as much a failure of psychology as of design,” writes pop philosopher Alain de Botton in his heartfelt case for good building, 2006’s The Architecture of Happiness.
On July 14, the U.S. Navy celebrated the end of a 12-year construction program that built 22 new buildings for its recruit-training center at Naval Station Great Lakes just north of Chicago.
Construction will start by spring 2011 on Dallas’ $2.7 billion LBJ Freeway (IH-635), one of the nation’s most congested highway systems.
Attorneys on July 12 began presenting their case in defense of William Rapetti, the Long Island, N.Y., crane rigger on trial for manslaughter.
The Washington State Dept. of Transportation describes the highway off-ramp improperly built on a new interchange in east Tacoma as "unfortunate and embarrassing."
Officials have broken ground on a South Dakota highway upgrade, the first of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act's $1.5-billion Transportation Investment Generating Economic Recovery program projects to get under way.
In a troubling sign for construction, the industry's unemployment rate showed no improvement in June after three straight months in which the rate declined, as the industry lost 22,000 jobs during the month, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported.
The manslaughter trial began on June 22 for a New York City crane rigger accused of causing a 2008 crane collapse in midtown Manhattan that killed seven, including the entire rigging crew and a civilian.
Amid political and environmental conflicts over Texas air quality, International Power announced a long-awaited powerplant expansion in South Texas.
A contractor has won a $5-million bonus for repaving 10,925 ft of runway in 120 days at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York City.
More than a year ago, Martha Bidez, a University of Alabama-Birmingham engineering professor, envisioned a new online master’s-degree track to focus explicitly on disaster prevention and systems safety.
Construction finally has begun on Via Verde, a sustainable, mixed-income housing project in the South Bronx designed by Grimshaw Architects and Dattner Architects.
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Lisa Jackson recently announced plans to mitigate environmental damage from sanitary sewer overflows (SSOs).
At a seasonally adjusted annual rate of $406.3 billion, new construction starts in May climbed 3% from the previous month, according to McGraw-Hill Construction, a division of The McGraw-Hill Companies.
Keep up to date on the latest news regarding the Gulf of Mexico oil spill, one of the worst environmental disasters in recent history.
The Kimbell Art Museum expansion project is finally moving forward. On May 27, the institution unveiled Renzo Piano's final design for a $70 million building adjacent to Louis Kahn’s masterpiece.
Already scrambling for highway funding, state departments of transportation and road contractors now are stymied by a nationwide shortage of pavement-marking paint.
The 19 finalists for the Aga Khan Award for Architecture are to be announced this afternoon during an event at the Museum of Modern Art in New York City.
Last week, two years after its first occupants moved in, the owners of the 55-story office tower at New York City’s One Bryant Park celebrated the building’s official opening with a reception in the lobby.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration is issuing an especially dire forecast for tropical storm activity in the Atlantic and Caribbean basins this hurricane season.
On May 18, President Obama named Milford Wayne Donaldson, FAIA, to head the Advisory Council on Historic Preservation (ACHP). He is the first architect to lead the agency since its creation in 1966.
It’s battling the oil gushing out of the well after the April 20 explosion aboard the Deepwater Horizon drill rig in the Gulf of Mexico.
From an Upper East Side townhouse to a SoHo storefront to a Long Island City industrial space, New York City’s Museum for African Art has had three different homes since opening to the public in 1984.
The rolling hills of southern Wisconsin are now home to the two highest-rated LEED-Platinum buildings in the country.
The Occupational Safety and Health Administration has expanded the list of organizations whose crane-operator certification programs it formally recognizes, with an agreement with the National Center for Construction Education and Research, Gainesville, Fla.
A small, little-known building by a young Renzo Piano may soon fall victim to the wrecking ball, reports the Italian newspaper La Stampa.
A report commissioned by the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC) argues that the Obama administration has the legal authority to use 30 existing federal programs worth over $72 billion to improve energy efficiency in U.S. building stock.
Vast amounts of low-level radioactive waste could be transported to a West Texas site if a commission made up mostly of Gov. Rick Perry appointees decides that Texas can accept such waste from 36 or more states.
New construction starts in April dropped 9% to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of $397.6 billion, according to McGraw-Hill Construction, a division of The McGraw-Hill Companies.
For the past year, construction firms have been searching for signs that the recession, which began over two years ago, was abating.
For the most part, contractors have not yet been engaged in cleanup or remediation efforts to combat the flow of oil encroaching on the Gulf Coast.
The American Institute of Architects has announced the 18 winners of the 2010 Housing Awards.
The U.S. Navy has selected seven U.S. and Guam-based joint venture teams for an indefinite-delivery, indefinite-quantity contract worth $4 billion for design-build work mostly on Guam over the next five years.
The Great Recession has enabled the California Department of Transportation to save approximately $2.4 billion in construction costs for major projects since 2006 due to competition and some bids coming in up to 40% less than estimates, says Kris Kuhl, supervising transportation engineer and official chief for contract awards and services at Caltrans. Overall, Kuhl says that so far this fiscal year, project bids are averaging 33.8% under estimates.
As the efforts to rebuild Haiti after its devastating January 12 earthquake inch along, a medical clinic is headed to the island nation that can be set up quickly and opened straight away.
In a roaring development cycle, size is an edge. The construction company with a monster lineup of staff, resources, equipment, and experience nearly always has a jump snaring attractive projects – benefiting from economies of scale and fatter profit potential.
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is initiating emergency permitting procedures to expedite cleanup in anticipation of oil coming ashore from the April 20 explosion of British Petroleum’s Deepwater Horizon rig about 50 miles off the Louisiana coast.
More than five years into a collaborative building-production movement called integrated project delivery, warnings abound: Don’t try this with strangers. New risks replace old ones. Beware of waivers of claims.
While some are testing the waters of integrated project delivery, a group within the U.S. Dept. of Energy is tilling greener pastures by devising a new design-build project-delivery model for fast-tracked, net-zero-energy buildings, public and private.
The U.S. Dept. of Energy (DOE), seeking commercial projects for its energy-efficient commercial buildings program, has extended a call for potential projects until noon Eastern on May 14.
The U.S. Dept. of Transportation said on May 7 that it is proposing changes in its requirements for disadvantaged-business-enterprise firms (DBEs), which include small companies owned by women and minorities.
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency on May 4 unveiled a draft rule to regulate coal ash, for the first time, under the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act.
Nashville and Middle Tennessee businesses and individuals are cleaning up and trying to return to thousands of buildings and homes inundated by floodwaters in a "once-in-one-thousand-year event."
After nearly a decade of review, the Dept. of Interior gave the go-ahead for the nation’s first offshore wind farm the $1 billion Cape Wind project off the coast of Nantucket on April 28. The facility could be operational by as soon as 2012.
Federal contracting officers will no longer be required to withhold 10 percent of fees for architectural and engineering services, following a four-year effort spearheaded by the AIA.
On April 29, 2010, the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC) officially launched its LEED for Neighborhood Development (LEED-ND) rating system.
Investigators are looking into the cause of a crane-boom failure that killed a worker at the construction site of Motiva’s Port Arthur refinery on April 19.
Navy Capt. Jim Wink said, "Right now they have the attention of the world." Wink, chief engineer for Joint Task Force (JTF) Haiti, spoke to ENR in his command tent beside the U.S. Embassy in Port-au-Prince.
A last-minute rescue effort has saved from destruction the company archives of famed mid-century modernist Minoru Yamasaki.
The warning shot came in a federal court in Louisiana, and it may signal the beginning of the end of one of the more costly aspects of the homebuilding boom of 2004-2007.
Uncertainty Clouds Recovery Picture For the largest design firms in the U.S., 2009 was a year of pain, followed by 2010, a year of uncertainty.
The AIA Committee on the Environment (COTE) recently announced its 14th annual Top Ten Green Projects. Demonstrating the range of contemporary green design, the 2010 winners include educational facilities, research centers, commercial spaces, and residential projects, all with varying scales and located in diverse geographies and climates.
We got a tour of the two-year-old U.S. Embassy in Port-au-Prince, including its mechanical spaces, to see how its seismic mitigation measures play out, and how they performed.
A sweeping design by Rafael Viñoly to convert New York's former Domino sugar refinery into homes, stores, and parks has been fully unveiled to the general public, at the same time that the city considers whether to let the controversy-prone project go forward.
Four New York State trade associations representing heavy construction contractors are suing the state over Gov. David Paterson's announcement in March that the New York Dept. of Transportation would halt payments on all statewide capital construction projects not funded through federal stimulus dollars.
Emissions from California’s construction and other off-road diesel equipment are less than 28% of what state officials have estimated, according to a recently released study by the Associated General Contractors of America.
John Carl ("Jack") Warnecke, FAIA, died of pancreatic cancer at his ranch in Healdsburg, CA, on April 17.
New construction starts in March came in at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of $435.6 billion, essentially unchanged from the previous month, according to McGraw-Hill Construction, a division of The McGraw-Hill Companies.
Southern California will spend hundreds of millions of dollars to repair water treatment and wastewater treatment infrastructure damaged in the April 4 Baja Earthquake, which was registered at 7.2 magnitude, state and city officials say.
Only about 125 miles separate Dubai and Abu Dhabi, but the Persian Gulf emirates can seem worlds apart in terms of opportunities for architects.
The next phase of U.S. regulations aimed at cleaning up airborne emissions from off-road diesel engines will start taking effect in just nine months.
Getting energy-efficient design into school construction can be tough, but the Gen7 modular-classroom building from American Modular Systems, Manteca, Calif., fits many of the latest energy-efficiency advances into one package, bringing the cutting edge of green technologies to modular school construction.
The Ritz-Carlton, Los Angeles opened last month marking the completion of the final piece of L.A. LIVE, the $2.5 billion sports, residential and entertainment district, which was inaugurated with the opening of STAPLES Center in 1999.
New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg on Monday announced an agreement that gives the city long-term planning and development control of Governor’s Island, a 172-acre chunk of largely undeveloped real estate in New York Harbor.
Stating Florida must comply with the original 1992 consent decree to address Everglades pollution, U.S. District Judge Federico A. Moreno granted on March 31 the Miccosukee tribe’s motion to compel completion of a key reservoir.
President Obama has signed a jobs measure that will extend the federal highway and transit programs through Dec. 31, add billions of dollars to the Highway Trust Fund and restore highway funding to its 2009 level.
Daniel Libeskind has added a rather unusual building type to his design resume: high-end, green prefab housing.
The International Code Council and the American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air-Conditioning Engineers Inc. have merged their efforts, rather than compete, to develop the nation's first "green" model code for commercial buildings.
At a seasonally adjusted annual rate of $440.9 billion, new construction starts in February climbed 5% from the previous month, according to McGraw-Hill Construction, a division of The McGraw-Hill Companies.
This week, the AIA announced the nine recipients of the 2010 AIA Young Architects Award. The prize recognizes individuals who have demonstrated exceptional leadership and made significant contributions to the profession early in their careers.
The New York Times is reporting that Testwell Laboratories owner and CEO V. Reddy Kancharla tried to commit suicide last week, two days after being convicted of falsifying concrete mix reports and filing them with the city.
San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom this week laid out a local stimulus plan that, if approved by the always unstable board of supervisors, would speed up four pending residential construction projects that have been held up due to the economy and city regulations.
The value of new construction starts slipped 1% in January to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of $419.3 billion, according to McGraw-Hill Construction, a division of The McGraw-Hill Companies.
At a seasonally adjusted annual rate of $405.0 billion, new construction starts in November dropped 9% from the previous month, according to McGraw-Hill Construction, a division of The McGraw-Hill Companies.
New York, N.Y. – November 20, 2009 – The value of new construction starts climbed 12% in October to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of $447.6 billion, it was reported by McGraw-Hill Construction, a division of The McGraw-Hill Companies. The upward push came from double-digit gains for nonresidential building and nonbuilding construction (public works and electric utilities). At the same time, residential building in October was unchanged from its September pace. Through the first ten months of 2009, total construction on an unadjusted basis came in at $350.1 billion, down 29% from the same period a year ago.
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