Revenues of top contractors in the tristate region held steady in 2010, even as the third year of the weak economy continued to force many to trim budgets and staff.

When an army of construction associations closed ranks last year to sue New York state transportation officials over halted payments to contractors, it was fair to expect some bad blood.

Regular readers of Engineering News-Record are familiar with the big names in the construction industry that lead off our annual “Top” lists of firms ranked by revenue.

Buried in the Robert F. Wagner Labor Archives of the NYU Tamiment Library, lies a faded, typewritten document recounting the origin of the New York Building Congress.

Amid the controversy surrounding Park51, the Muslim community center and worship space in Lower Manhattan labeled the “Ground Zero Mosque” by its opponents, the young New York-based firm SOMA Architects last week quietly unveiled designs for the new 15-story building. “I think the location of the center has been overexposed and overrated,” says Michel Abboud, principal at SOMA. Image courtesy of SOMA Architects SOMA Architects unveiled designs for the controversial Park51 Islamic Center in Lower Manhattan, but the young company is looking to work with a larger, more experienced firm if the project goes forward. Abboud recently sat down in

One thing we’ve come to expect every year when it comes to our annual, year-end “Best Of” competition is that it’s nearly impossible to make any assumptions or predictions as to the outcome. Related Links: Best of 2010 Project of the Year: New Meadowlands Stadium Architectural Design: The Juilliard School Renovation and Expansion, New York Civil/Public Works: Fulton Street Transit Center Foundations, New York, N.Y. Cultural: Queens Theater-in-the-Park, Corona, N.Y. Cultural: Queens Community College Kupferberg Holocaust Resource Center, Bayside, N.Y. Engineering Design: Poughkeepsie Railroad Bridge/Walkway Over the Hudson, Poughkeepsie, N.Y. Environmental/Flood Control: Horseshoe Road Superfund Site Environmental/Flood Control: Harlem Riverbank

Staten Island’s first new courthouse in more than 75 years, and the City’s first green courthouse, is rising in the St. George section of the borough. The $174 million project is transforming a four-acre surface parking lot and the former site of a 19th century Marine Hospital Quarantine Grounds into a civic center comprised of the courthouse, a public park memorializing the hospital’s former burial grounds and a 600-car parking garage. The five-story, 182,000-sq-ft facility will house the New York State Supreme Court and the Richmond County Criminal courts, consolidating outdated court facilities now spread across four locations. The Dormitory

Long before most people thought of green as anything other than a color, New York City began building sustainable buildings. Now the city is aiming to reduce its overall carbon footprint 30% by 2030 and for municipal operations by 2017. “That is a pretty tall order,” says Tom Paino, director of the sustainability unit at the Department of Design and Construction (DDC) of New York City. “We are looking at a broad spectrum of the city’s buildings to see where we can meet that executive order.” Mayor Michael Bloomberg has committed $100 million annually in capital funds to reduce energy

New York is a center of commerce, a hubbub of construction activity, even in difficult economic times, but it’s also home to millions of people. Mindful of residents and the city’s visitors, the New York Building Congress/New York Building Foundation’s “Construction for a Livable City” initiative aims to enhance the industry’s image and improve bystanders’ quality of life by making worksites more attractive and enhancing community relations. Photo courtesy Skanska USA Building Skanska USA Building has completed the first two phases of the Brooklyn Bridge Park project following livable city principles. Photo courtesy Bovis Lend Lease Bovis Lend Lease installed

It wasn’t long ago that a listing of major healthcare projects in the New York-New Jersey-Connecticut region would have at least one big job on the campus of every single large medical institution in the region. Related Links: Back to "Serious But Stable" Today, the list is thinner, and designers and contractors are looking to win smaller projects from these same institutions and scouting their master planning efforts to see what’s on the horizon – and how long it will take to get there. Here’s a sampling of the dwindling list of major jobs that are still ongoing, and a