The new Sixth Street Viaduct, when completed next year, will be hard to miss. Ten pairs of continuous arches will create a sinuous profile as the 3,060-ft-long, 100-ft-wide viaduct soars over the 101 Freeway, several railroads, the LA River and the downtown Los Angeles arts district.

Over the last several months, much has been written about essential workers, which includes those in the construction industry. The build environment requires workers to be on jobsites daily while also risking exposure to COVID-19. Since the onset of the pandemic, construction workers have had to work quickly and nimbly to adjust to the new realities of a COVID-19 world.

With COVID-19 disproportionately affecting Hispanic communities, it is important to highlight the role the Hispanic community plays in the construction industry and the impact they have on the future of cities. In California, nearly one-third of construction workers are Hispanic.

Reprinted courtesy of Ed Segovia, Construction Executive, a publication of Associated Builders and Contractors. All rights reserved.

Go to any property and construction technology panel and someone is inevitably going to say that the construction industry has been slower than other sectors to adopt tech-forward practices, but this ignores how responsive construction has been to solving problems for as long as people have been building.

Reprinted courtesy of Cyrus Izzo, ENR and Phillip Ross, ENR

Despite California’s strict government interventions in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, the state’s economy is poised for post-pandemic growth at a faster rate than the rest of the U.S, says a new report from the University of California-Los Angeles Anderson School of Management.

In the coming weeks and months, COVID-19 vaccines will be distributed around the United States. Employers will have questions about vaccination procedures, such as whether they may require employees to be vaccinated, what they may ask about employees’ vaccination records, and whether they must accommodate employees with religious opposition to being vaccinated. Recently, the EEOC updated its guidance, What You Should Know About COVD-19 and the ADA Rehabilitation Act, and Other EEO Laws, to address these vaccination concerns. This alert addresses the essential points of the EEOC’s guidance.

Reprinted courtesy of Amy R. Patton, Payne & Fears, James R. Moss, Jr., Payne & Fears and Raymond J. Nhan, Payne & Fears
Ms. Patton may be contacted at arp@paynefears.com
Mr. Moss may be contacted at jrm@paynefears.com
Mr. Nhan may be contacted at rjn@paynefears.com

COVID-19 has changed how people live, work and interact in their personal and professional lives. While time will bring back some semblance of normalcy, there will be some facets that will be changed for the foreseeable future. That is clearly the case in the construction industry as it has had to quickly navigate and rethink safety, supply chain issues, design changes and more, many of which have been “in the works” for years. Many of these sweeping changes and new approaches, discussed below, will remain in place long after the outbreak has subsided.

Reprinted courtesy of Deanna L. Koestel, Construction Executive, a publication of Associated Builders and Contractors. All rights reserved.

A 500,000-sq-ft hybrid electric F-150 truck manufacturing facility is being built at Ford Motor Co.'s Rouge Center in Dearborn, Mich. Once it's completed in summer 2021, the $700-million production facility is expected to add 300 jobs and produce Ford's F-150 PowerBoost hybrid truck.

As a wide variety of industries explore sustainable improvements, many look to options like process changes to improve efficiency while cutting resource uses. Those alterations can help, but it's sometimes necessary to do things differently regarding the materials used.

The construction industry is a prime example with its use of concrete. Cement is a binding material that mixes with sand, water and gravel to make concrete, the world's most widely used construction material. Portland cement—invented in the early 1800s—is part of the vast majority of concrete used today. The process of making it causes problems for the environment, however.

Reprinted courtesy of Emily Folk, Construction Executive, a publication of Associated Builders and Contractors. All rights reserved.

No one could have predicted the speed and reach of COVID-19 in the last few months, or the overall impact to the construction industry. There have been drastic changes in operations and implementation along with disruptions to the industry’s supply chain. Safety on the job site has become more important than ever, especially as contractors focus on preventing the spread of COVID-19.

Financial standing plays a major role in construction projects, and coming out of COVID-19 will be no different. Because of the pandemic’s far-reaching impact, there may be unforeseen delays in project funding due to the dip in Q1 market conditions and Q2 earnings reports. In North Texas, for example, more than $2 billion in bond referendums were pushed from May 2020 to November 2020, and potentially even further. The biggest uncertainty is that the pandemic’s true depth is not understood, but the construction industry is made up of committed and hardworking thought leaders who will push through and work together to resolve these challenges.

Reprinted courtesy of Corbett Nichter, Construction Executive, a publication of Associated Builders and Contractors. All rights reserved.

The trend toward sustainable construction is changing the way projects are designed and built. The demand for green buildings continues to rise driven by increasing concerns over global warming, tighter environmental regulations and a growing focus on occupant health. In response to this demand, the construction sector is embracing green practices including delivering LEED-certified commercial projects.

LEED, a third-party certification program sponsored by the U.S. Green Building Council, has verified the sustainability of thousands of buildings. Last year the program announced it had surpassed 100,000 registered and certified global LEED commercial projects and noted that the organization certifies more than 2.6 million square feet of space each day. And, according to data from Statista, the number of LEED registrations has steadily increased since the certification program’s implementation in 1993 with registrations in the United States alone reaching approximately 69,066 in 2019.

Reprinted courtesy of Ruben Mejia, Construction Executive, a publication of Associated Builders and Contractors. All rights reserved.

We talked with Professor Martin Fischer of Stanford University’s Civil and Environmental Engineering Department in the run-up to WDBE. Our discussion covered what drew him to the discipline and the practical challenges of applying BIM in the modern built environment.

An essential part of contemporary design, Building Information Modelling (BIM) is a valuable collaborative practice when supported by the right suite of tools and workflows. It helps disparate teams work together, model progress on a build, and has been an area of interest for Professor Fischer since the start of his career.