Despite a historic pace for the installation of new railroad signaling and monitoring technologies, U.S. freight and commuter railroads will not meet the Federal Railroad Administration-imposed deadline to equip infrastructure assets with positive train controls (PTCs) by Dec. 31, according to an August report from the agency.
As the fallout from the Animas Mine blowout continues, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is under fire as criticism mounts regarding the agency's handling of the Aug. 5 spill that spewed 3 million gallons of mine wastewater into Colorado's Animas River.
State and tribal officials in Colorado and New Mexico have reopened the Animas and San Juan rivers since an accidental 3-million-gal toxic spill from an abandoned mine on Aug. 5.
Cement manufacturers are consolidating and posting strong profits, but their successes are leaving regional contractors often dependent on only one or two suppliers, says the Federal Trade Commission.
Related Links: Losing Bidder Protests Big Texas Tollway Award Bergstrom Expressway Project Overview The award last month of a $581- million design-build contract to a Fluor-Balfour Beatty team to build a new expressway near Austin is not sitting well with the losing team or with local contractors. Texas firms say they are being squeezed out of competition by mandatory design-build procurement rules on large projects, while the losing bidder on the Bergstrom Expressway, led by Spanish giant Ferrovial Agroman, has challenged its loss in a bid protest.The Ferrovial Agroman team claims that the Central Texas Regional Mobility Authority graded its
Photo Courtesy of Mat-Su Borough \A $120-million rail link at Port MacKenzie, near Anchorage, is set to follow local-hire rule. Related Links: Gov. Bill Walker: Why I'm restoring Alaska Hire requirements With continuing oil-price impacts on Alaska jobs and a looming state budget impasse that could send thousands of public employees to the unemployment line, Gov. Bill Walker (I) on June 10 reinstated a 90% local-hire rule for state-funded construction projects. The rule, which would affect both blue- and white-collar jobs, is drawing a mixed reaction from local contractors.According to Walker, a governor is allowed to restore the rule if
A Skanska-DPR joint venture is leaving its role as general contractor of Apple's "spaceship"—the ring-shaped main building of the tech giant's new corporate headquarters now under construction in Cupertino, Calif.
Related Links: Canada National Energy Board's Final Audit Zings TransCanada's Fieldwork Engineer Blows Whistle on Canada Pipeline Inspections The Canadian Energy Pipeline Association told Canada's parliament in May that pipeline regulator, the National Energy Board, does not have the funding to hire and maintain the quality of engineering staff needed to perform its functions.In response, NEB Chair Peter Watson told lawmakers, at a senate committee hearing on the pending Pipeline Safety Act, that salaries offered by the board cannot compete with those paid in the private sector. Plus, entry-level engineers hired by NEB jump ship when they have more experience,
Related Links: Opponents Sue To Halt Red River Flood Control Project Army Corps Plan Would Tame Red River, Prevent 100-Year Flood Minnesota and North Dakota are at odds over the construction of a rural ring levee opponents say is part of the approximately $2-billion Fargo, N.D.-Moorhead, Minn., Diversion Project designed to change the course of the Red River, which threatens to flood both cities almost every spring.In May, a federal judge stopped construction until the Minnesota Dept. of Natural Resources completes its ongoing environmental review of the project. The Fargo-Moorhead Diversion Authority says losing the remainder of the construction season
Crane operator Thomas L. Bales, 40, overturned his crane into a ditch near Elgin, Neb., in late May while driving to the construction site of Prairie Breeze II, a wind-energy farm Wanzek Construction is building for Invenergy, a wind-energy company. Arnold Jelinek, vice president of Fargo, S.D.-based Wanzek, confirmed the circumstances surrounding Bales' death, one of a gradually rising number of fatalities connected to wind turbines and their construction and maintenance.In a news release, Darwin Crag, acting Nebraska-area director for the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, said Bales had worked for Wanzek Construction for only 10 days."Even though temporary workers
