With the 2009 federal fiscal year set to end Sept. 30, House and Senate negotiators have agreed on a government-wide stopgap measure that would provide enough money to keep federal agencies operating for one additional month. Lawmakers hope that the "continuing resolution," which runs through Oct. 31, will provide time for congressional appropriators to reach agreement on the spending bills for the full fiscal 2010. Attached to the "CR," on which House and Senate conferees reached agreement Sept. 24, are parallel one-month funding and operating authority extensions for surface transportation and Federal Aviation Administration programs. Current highway-transit and aviation authorization

France’s government has announced a $10.3-billion freight-railroad investment program that aims to take two million trucks off the roads a year by 2020 and reduce greenhouse-gas emissions by over two million tonnes. At the same time, the government has begun procuring four new high-speed passenger lines totaling 660 kilometers, three of them under public-private partnerships. France’s high-speed network is planned to double in size to 4,000 km by 2020.

In the second-largest application ever of its kind, hundreds of truckloads of polystyrene block are helping expedite an expansion of Salt Lake City’s Transit Express (TRAX) light-rail system. The lightweight material, akin to styrofoam, is helping Utah Transit Authority save at least $20 million and eight months of time by avoiding soil settlement issues. Foam-filled foundations consist of polystyrene blocks used to prevent settlement along route of Utah light-rail system. The $370-million, four-station project extends the existing 19-mile, 28-station dual-line system five miles. A joint venture of Stacy and Witbeck Inc., Alameda, Calif., and Kiewit Western Co., Littleton, Colo., holds

Nevada Gov. Jim Gibbons (R) expects to receive $45 million in previously approved SAFETEA-LU funding from the Federal Railroad Administration for planning and environmental analysis of the first segment of a $12-billion magnetic-levitation rail line from Las Vegas to Primm, Calif. The 269-mile line from Anaheim, Calif., to Las Vegas would be capable of speeds of up to 310 mph. FRA has not confirmed the announcement.

Next year, officials at Norman Y. Mineta San Jose International Airport (SJC) in California will wrap up a $1.3-billion modernization program that adds more than 840,000 sq ft of new terminal space, a 1.6-million-sq-ft consolidated rental car and parking garage, and a streamlined internal road network. Photo: Jim Parson / ENR Fast Track San Jose airport expansion, including a new terminal, used a design-build approach that helped shave some seven years and $3 billion off original estimates. The program only got under way in mid-2007 and was originally projected to cost more than three times as much and take 10

Columbus, Ohio-based American Electric Power has begun to capture carbon dioxide at a coal-fired powerplant in New Haven, W. Va., as part of a $100-million, 20-MW validation-size carbon-capture and storage-system project. AEP hopes to begin injecting the gas into a well by Sept. 25. The firm demonstrated the technology on a 1.7-MW unit and has applied for $334 million in federal stimulus money to fund about half the cost of commercial installation. The system uses a chilled ammonia process to capture carbon dioxide and, at commercial scale, will capture 90% of the gas from part of the 1,300-MW plant. The

The Portland Cement Association is defending its sample ordinance for high-performance buildings despite strong objections from critics and a call to withdraw the proposal. “PCA will continue to promote our concepts and views, work to educate the general public and encourage the adoption of more stringent building-code requirements by state and local jurisdictions for the good of the people and their communities and the environment,” says Stephen S. Szoke, PCA’s director of codes and standards. The group has “no intention” of withdrawing its recommendation for code changes, says Szoke, the lead author of the controversial document. He says PCA plans

With a 500-participant, trans-Atlantic crowd and the venue of a science center­—reached by a rollicking boat ride across New York Harbor from Manhattan—the H209 Forum, “Water Challenges for Coastal Cities,” struck an aquatic note from the start. The Sept. 9-10 conference at the Liberty Science Center in Jersey City, N.J., was a joint production of Dutch and New York interests who used the 400th anniversary of Henry Hudson’s historic landfall in New York Harbor to launch a dialogue on mutual concerns about water challenges of all sorts, including increasing demand on water supplies and infrastructure and the prospective effects of

The Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC) is close to completing tunneling for its second phase of construction, with less than 2 kilometers left out of 35 km, following the completion of India’s longest tunnel in an urban area built using the New Austrian Tunneling Method (NATM). The 2.85-km-long tunnel is part of the 22.7-km Airport Express Line, which will connect the Delhi city center to the international airport when completed in the summer of 2010. Photo: Neelam Mathews / ENR Delhi Metro rail cars are delivered by Russian Antonov cargo plane earlier this year. Photo: Delhi Metro Rail Corp. New

Exasperated with neglect from the government of India’s eastern state of Bihar, two remote villages on top of a hill have built a 4-kilometer-long road using the most basic tools, including hammers, chisels and trowels. Barwan Kala and Barwan Khurd, located in the forested Kaimur Hills, have a combined population of 3,000. most of whom are farmers. Photo: Prashant Ravi Villagers used muscle-powered levers to remove boulders from road’s path. “We are cursed,” says Chandrama Yadav, a local resident involved in the construction work in an exclusive to ENR. “Over 100 men between 30 and 60 years are not married