In the News The Civil Quarterly (TCQ) features original research collected quarterly from civil contractors, engineers and owners. The research provides a snapshot of the current business health of contractors operating in the dynamic civil sector, and each issue also offers insights into some of the many trends that are transforming the sector through research, interviews and feature… Read More »The Civil Quarterly 2022 Issue 4
Infrastructure is a new editorial destination that explores the systems at the core of our lives.
In the News Since 1970, the world population of wild animals has declined some 68%, the Living Planet Index finds, due to climate change, human encroachment on habitat, and other factors. Soon, some lucky critters in Southern California will have access to much more viable territory, The Week reports. A major infrastructure project, the Wallis Annenberg wildlife crossing, will relink the Santa Monica Mountains, the Simi Hills, and the Santa Susana Mountains, long severed by the busy 101 freeway. The effort is being… Read More »Wild Infrastructure: Construction Begins on the World’s Largest Animal Crossing
In the News China’s President Xi Jinping has announced a massive new infrastructure investment to combat further declines in the country’s economic growth, Bloomberg News reports. The total lockdown of Shanghai due to a COVID outbreak and fears of similar action in Beijing have contributed to a declining Yuan and CSI 300 stock index, and Xi’s announcement had the hoped-for immediate effect of spurring a bounce back to both. Prior to the announcement, China already had a $2.3 trillion infrastructure investment in the… Read More »China to Combat Economic Anxiety With Massive Infrastructure Investment
In the News In February, President Joe Biden signed an executive order with considerable ramifications for the construction industry. The order (EO 14063) requires project labor agreements on stateside federal construction contracts of $35 million or more. An article about the order, published in the National Law Review, characterizes project labor agreements as “a collective bargaining agreement between a contractor and the building trade union on a specific construction project.” Among the provisions in EO 14063, the National Law Review notes that the… Read More »Biden Signs Executive Order Requiring Labor Agreement for Federal Construction Contracts
In the News A flood of money is about to hit the construction industry, thanks to the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act that President Joe Biden signed into law late last year. Perhaps not surprisingly, then, the U.S. Department of Labor is updating the rules determining worker pay on federal construction jobs, first set by the 1931 Davis-Bacon Act, which tied the size of paychecks to prevailing local wage rates. Labor law firm Fisher & Phillips outlines some of the major changes in… Read More »Proposed Regulatory Updates Will Affect Worker Pay
In the News The U.S. General Services Administration is one of the nation’s biggest landlords. As part of its sweeping mandate, the agency maintains thousands of government properties and constructs federal court houses, office buildings, border stations, and other structures nationwide. So when GSA adopts new construction standards — usually after exhaustive study and participation by the private sector — the building industry as a whole takes notice. In March, GSA announced new standards for asphalt and concrete used in construction. Why target… Read More »Federal Agency Adopts Lower-Carbon Asphalt and Concrete Standards
Case Study Learn how the Ohio Department of Transportation (ODOT) overcame issues with late bids, errors, and paper processing by adopting online bidding to overcome these inefficiencies. After experiencing the benefits of going paperless with the Bid Express® service, the DOT partnered with Infotech® to educate and inform Local Public Agencies (LPAs) about the service.
Research Report The Civil Quarterly (TCQ) features original research collected quarterly from civil contractors, engineers and owners. The research provides a snapshot of the current business health of contractors operating in the dynamic civil sector, and each issue also offers insights into some of the many trends that are transforming the sector through research, interviews and feature articles. This quarter’s issue features: The latest on civil contractors’ business conditions, including their confidence in the market and the impact of skilled worker shortages… Read More »The Civil Quarterly 2022 Issue 1
In the News A speaker at the U.S. Department of Agriculture‘s 2022 Outlook Forum, which occurred last month, revealed some interesting geopolitical tension around infrastructure. According to Drovers, Elizabeth C. Economy, senior advisor for China in the U.S. Department of Commerce, says that participants are souring on China’s Belt and Road Initiative: “Many countries have infrastructure needs that other lenders or donors couldn’t or wouldn’t meet that China fulfilled,” Economy says. “A lot of these Belt and Road projects are done for geostrategic reasons.… Read More »Agriculture and Infrastructure, an Enlightening Relationship
In the News It’s been more than 100 days since Joe Biden signed the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, and his administration is eager to show taxpayers what they’ve gotten so far for all those billions in public money. Distributing more than half-a-trillion dollars is no small task, so in January the White House released a guidebook to the law and a webinar series for “state, local, tribal, and territorial governments and other partners” who want a share of the bounty. Former New… Read More »Federal Infrastructure Spending: The First 100 Days
In the News President Joe Biden scored a win in November with the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, but has failed to pass social and environmental pieces of his so-called Build Back Better plan. Still, the administration hopes that the infrastructure spending will support its plans to combat climate change and inequity, as a Federal Highway Administration memo of Dec. 16 suggests. The memo calls for “Investments and projects that … improve the condition, resilience and safety of road and bridge assets consistent… Read More »Billions to Spend on Infrastructure, and Limited Agreement on How to Spend It