Heavy and civil engineering sectors added more than 3,800 new jobs last month, for a healthy 2.5% gain, according to just-released figures from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

In the last year, notes the agency, nearly 28,000 new heavy and civil engineering jobs have been filled, bringing the overall total, as of September, up to 1.1 million.

Those figures are part of the latest BLS jobs report showing a national employment increase last month in all industries of 254,000. The construction industry, meanwhile, was up by 25,000 over the month before, and 238,000 over September of 2023.

Additional employment growth was recorded in the nonresidential building sector, with an increase of 37,100 jobs over last fall; and in nonresidential specialty trade construction, up by nearly 113,000.
In a statement, Anirban Basu, chief economist with Associated Builders and Contractors, said the nation's construction industry has now added new jobs "for the fifth consecutive month, despite labor shortages."

Basu additionally forecasts that "hiring should persist in the coming months, with contractors expecting to increase their staffing levels over the next six months."

Nationally, significant gains were recorded in healthcare, with an increase of 45,000 new jobs in September; government work up by 31,000; and food services and drinking places, with a 69,000 jump.

The BLS report noted that "employment showed little change over the month in other major industries," specifically noting mining, oil and gas extraction, manufacturing, and transportation, and warehousing, among other industries.

Speaking with reporters in the White House, President Biden described the 254,000 September job gain as "incredible news." In a separate formal statement, Biden added: "We've created 16 million jobs, unemployment remains low, and wages are growing faster than prices."

Looking at the latest overall job numbers, the publication Barron's said those figures "should alleviate concerns that the U.S. is rapidly heading into a recession."

The new report, added the New York Sun, offers the "latest evidence that America's labor market is solid enough to support steady hiring and a growing economy."
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Offering a different take, a statement from the Trump presidential campaign remarked: "Another 7,000 manufacturing jobs were lost last month."

By Garry Boulard

Photo Courtesy of Pixabay 

Some ten months after it announced plans to build a new facility in Scottsdale, Arizona, the semiconductor manufacturing company ASM International has entered into a development agreement that will lead to the construction of a 400,000-square-foot headquarters.

Based in Almere, Netherlands, ASM is regarded as a world leader in the manufacturing of semiconductor wafer processing equipment to be used in the fabrication of semiconductor devices.

Launched in 1968, the company enjoys around $2.7 billion in annual revenue, with facilities up and running throughout Asia and Europe. ASM opened its U.S. operations in Phoenix in 1976.

Now, after extensive talks and study, members of the Scottsdale City Council have agreed to enter into a development agreement that will reimburse ASM for building whatever public infrastructure is needed to make the new combined headquarters and research facility a reality.

The new facility, ASM has told the Phoenix Business Journal, will feature "robust water conservation systems and green infrastructure." The statement added that upon completion, the new facility will be a "key corporate and innovation center where our talented teams will advance the semiconductor technologies of tomorrow."

Earlier reports have indicated that ASM will spend upwards of $400 million over the course of the next five years developing and building its new Scottsdale presence.
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The facility is expected to be built near the southeast corner of Scottsdale Road and Arizona State Route 101 on land the company previously purchased for around $33 million.

By Garry Boulard

A long-studied project to build a new terminal at the Clovis Regional Airport is moving forward with a grant from Washington for $15.7 million.

The funding is coming from the Federal Aviation Administration and is part of a larger $33.4 million the agency is sending to New Mexico for various airport infrastructure projects.

Located six miles to the east of downtown Clovis, the 1,500-acre airport, off New Mexico State Road 523, was opened in 1959 and has been mostly used for general aviation.

The airport processed around 13,000 passenger enplanements last year, up from some 5,000 in 2019.

The FAA earlier this year awarded $2.8 million to the Clovis airport for the reconstruction of a taxiway, as well as work sealing the pavement and pavement joints of the airport's runway.

In February, according to a statement issued by New Mexico Democrat Martin Heinrich, an initial $3.5 million in funding coming out of the Infrastructure and Investment Jobs Act was awarded for the design work on the new terminal.
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As planned, work on the new 21,000-square-foot facility is expected to begin by no later than early next year, with a rough completion date of mid-2026.

By Garry Boulard

The listing of a 19-story building based in Bartlesville, Oklahoma that was designed in 1952 by the noted architect Frank Lloyd Wright has made national news.

Problems selling what is called the Price Tower have caught the attention of the New York Times, which several days ago remarked that the building was once listed for $6.2 million but is now set to go to auction with a starting bid of $600,000.

"There has been some concern that no local employer is in need of as much office space that the tower provides," the paper remarked of the 60,335-square-foot building, "so the new owners would likely need to take on a hodgepodge of tenants, and look to address needed renovations."

One of the reasons why people remain interested in the Price Tower is because it is, for Wright, an odd-sized structure. Wright usually devoted his energies to one- and two-story homes and office buildings. A high-rise was an unusual Wright project, as he himself admitted, when likening the tower to an "upraised hand on the prairie," and a "tree that escaped the crowded forest."

But the ultimate reason for the interest is the connection with Wright himself. Regarded as one of the most important architects in the world, Wright designed easily more than 1,000 buildings before his death in 1959, was friends with President Harry Truman and Albert Einstein, and was the cover feature for Time, then regarded as the most-read magazine in the country.

In 1991 the American Institute of Architects put it quite simply: Wright, it said, was "the greatest American architect of all time."

Given his prodigious output, it is only natural that buildings designed by Wright should still, decades after he designed them, end up on the market.

According to the site Frank Lloyd Wright Building Conservancy, there are currently ten Wright-designed buildings on the market, ranging in price from the $639,000 Hickox House of Kankakee, Illinois, which features Japanese architectural design elements and was built in 1900; to the $8.9 million Lykes House in Phoenix, completed in 1959 and famous for its concentric circle floorplan.

Just in the last year alone, some eight Wright homes located in Connecticut, Illinois, Michigan, Ohio, and Wisconsin have been sold. The Connecticut property, called Tirrana, went for $6 million, and, according to Architectural Digest, is one of Wright's largest creations, with a "solar hemicycle design" that makes use of a "curved glass facade crafted to take advantage of the sun's movement throughout the day."
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The two-day auction for the Price Tower is scheduled to begin on November 18 and is being handled by the realty firm Cushman & Wakefield, which has offices in Oklahoma City and Tulsa.

​By Garry Boulard

A public arena built in the middle of World War II in El Paso could be in line for significant upgrades and renovation work, depending upon the mood of voters in November.

Located at 4100 E. Paisano Drive, the El Paso County Coliseum was built with funding from the New Deal’s Public Works Administration and designed to accommodate rodeo and livestock shows.

Upon its May 1942 opening, the building was hailed by the El Paso Times as the “largest and finest structure of its kind in this area of the Southwest.”

In more recent decades, the building has been used to house everything from concerts to sporting events, roller derbies, and dog shows.

County officials have long contemplated either replacing the 6,500-seat stadium, which was built at a cost of $321,000, or simply expanding it.

Reports published in the spring of 2023 indicated that the U.S. General Services Administration, in charge of a project seeing the modernization of the nearby International Bridge of the Americas, was contemplating leveling the coliseum in order to create more room for the bridge project.

When the GSA subsequently pulled away from that plan, members of the El Paso County Commission moved to include new work on the 20, 240-square-foot coliseum in a bond package that now has a total dollar worth of $323.8 million.

That proposal is calling for $105.5 million out of that $323.8 million to go for work on the coliseum that would include new roofing, the installation of a new air conditioning system, upgraded ceilings, and enhanced Americans with Disabilities Act improvements.
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It has been thought that some of the $105.5 million may also be used to reconvert what is known as the Sherman Barn, just to the rear of the coliseum, into a music hall.

By Garry Boulard

Photo Courtesy of Preservation Texas

One of the cutting-edge leaders in battery-electric trucks that can be driven either by humans or autonomously has announced plans to set up an engineering presence in metro Phoenix.
Founded in late 2021 and based in Fremont, California, the Terraline company is particularly known for the production of the Tangra LH1, a battery-electric heavy truck that has a range of more than 500 miles.
In reporting on the launch of its Class 8 truck last November, the publication Transport Topics noted that the company already had orders for the delivery of the electric trucks stretching into 2026.
In an earlier published statement, Terraline noted that its battery-electric trucks are designed to eliminate carbon dioxide emissions, adding: “We are fully committed to benefitting the planet by disrupting a massive segment of the transportation industry.”
The website OurCrowd has estimated that Terraline’s developing fleet of all-electric trucks have the potential of supplanting some 22 million tons of CO2 on an annual basis by 2032, marking a "significant shift towards sustainability in an industry traditionally associated with high emissions.”
The company’s decision to establish a presence in southern Arizona comes after protracted discussions with state officials, in particular officials working with the Arizona Commerce Authority.
In a statement, Graham Doorley, chief executive officer of Terraline, lauded Arizona’s “business-friendly environment, exceptional engineering talent, and reduced operations costs” as factors in setting up what will be the company’s engineering headquarters.

​By Garry Boulard

The federal Department of Labor is pledging to increase the number and quality of employment opportunities nationally for people with disabilities, a category that comprises around 13% of the country’s population.

That pledge is coming as part of the agency’s National Disability Employment Awareness Month, an annual affair every October that seeks to educate the larger public on the value of individuals with disabilities in the workplace, as well as their overall contribution to the economy.

The event is rooted in an act of Congress passed in 1945 declaring the first week of each October as National Employ the Physically Handicapped Week. Nearly two decades later, the word “physically” was removed from the designation in an effort to acknowledge the contributions and needs of individuals with a wide range of disabilities.

In 1988, Congress expanded the week to a month, and at the same time changed the name of the education outreach campaign to the National Disability Employment Awareness Month.

According to Labor Department figures, just over 22% of people with a defined disability were employed nationally in 2023. That figure, said the department in its report Persons with a Disability, represented the “highest recorded ratio since comparable data were first collected in 2008.”

But while the number of people with disabilities who are employed has gradually increased in recent years, the “employment population ratio was much lower for people with a disability than for those with no disability.”

Viewed from the opposite perspective, “unemployment rates were much higher for people with a disability than for those with no disability across all educational attainment groups.”

Improved disability employment numbers have been most notable in the part time category, with such workers seen as being nearly “twice as likely” to work part time as workers with no disabilities.

Age also plays a factors in the overall picture, with greater numbers of older people having disabilities than younger people, a figure “reflecting the increased incidence of disability with age.”  Moreover, women were more likely to have a disability than men, “partly reflecting the greater life expectancy of women.”

The Labor Report additionally points to the production, transportation, sales, and office occupations as seeing the greatest number of disabled workers.

A significant upward trend in disability employment was first noticed in the early 1990s with the implementation of the Ticket to Work initiative which allows former workers with disabilities to pursue new jobs without fear of losing their Social Security Disability Insurance and Medical benefits.
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That simple feature, notes the publication Forbes, “offers valuable support and work incentives that make attempting a return to work less daunting.”

By Garry Boulard

E-commerce giant Amazon is expanding its facility footprint in Colorado with the purchase of a massive 625,000-square-foot warehouse within the borders of the 226-acre DIA Logistics Park in Aurora.

The $86.1 million purchase of the property at 6300 Powhaten Road comes at the same time that the Seattle-based Amazon plopped down another $5 million for a 13-acre parcel adjacent to the Powhaten Road building.

The park is located some 2 miles to the south of the Denver International Airport.

The warehouse is designated as a Class A facility and was built last year. It features 40-foot-tall ceilings, nearly 4,000 square feet of office space, and 92 loading docks.

The DIA Logistics Park is made up of eight similarly massive warehouse structures built for LEED certification and spread over 226 acres.

Amazon has spent an estimated $11.3 billion in Colorado in the last nearly 15 years on the building of facilities for various uses. Work has been ongoing on a 3.5 million, four-story building in Longmont this year that will serve as an Amazon fulfillment center.
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Work is also nearing completion on a 38,000-square-foot delivery station near the Grand Junction Regional Airport which will serve as what is known as a "last mile" facility.  Amazon purchased the site for that facility for $2.7 million earlier this year.

​By Garry Boulard

Public input is expected to be received until later this month on a project that will see the building of a new bridge in northern New Mexico.

The Canjilon Bridge, which is a part of U.S. Route 84 in Rio Arriba County, was built in 1960 and has long been thought to be in need of an upgrade.

The structure, located just to the west of the popular Ghost Ranch retreat and education center, serves nearly 1,800 vehicles a day and has seen some substructural deterioration through the years.

The New Mexico Department of Transportation has issued a Request for Input regarding the replacement of the bridge, which spans the Canjilon Creek. In so doing, the state DOT noted in a press release that the purpose of the bridge replacement project would be to address structural inadequacies and "correct current substandard bridge thickness and width."

If built, the new bridge will have 12-foot driving lanes, with 6-foot shoulders on each side.

The DOT notice additionally states that a temporary bridge will be built to serve traffic during the construction of a new Canjilon Bridge.

Public comment on the project will be accepted online until October 21.

​By Garry Boulard

Photo Courtesy of New Mexico Department of Transportation

All signs are pointing to a labor strike impacting port operations along the East Coast and in the Gulf of Mexico.

After months of talks, representatives with the International Longshoreman’s Association, with a membership of some 85,000 dock workers, and the United States Maritime Alliance, have not been able to come to terms that would prevent a walk-out.

On Sunday, President Biden announced that he would not intervene in the matter, referencing his respect for the collective bargaining process. In a statement, White House spokesperson Robyn Patterson remarked: “We continue to encourage the parties to continue negotiating towards an agreement that benefits all sides and prevents any disruptions.”

At issue is a labor demand for increased pay, but also stronger guarantees on the part of management that automated systems on the docks in question will be not used to replace workers.

In public comments, ILA President Harold Daggett remarked: “We have to fight for what we rightfully deserve. Let’s get a contract, and let’s move on with the world.”

In a statement issued last week, the United States Maritime Alliance said it had great respect for the ILA workers: “We have a shared history of working together and are committed to bargaining.”

But the alliance blamed the union for the current negotiation impasse, attacking ILA representatives for a “repeated refusal to come to the table and bargain on a new master contract.”

Should the ILA decide to strike, notes the Washington Post, it would result in “freezing commercial shipping on a massive scale and disrupting the national economy weeks before the presidential election.”

With the ILA workers handling cargo that includes everything from building materials to electronics, cars, and food, the strike has the potential of costing the U.S. economy upwards of $1 billion.

Altogether 36 ports, handling more than half of all U.S. container imports, would be impacted by the job action.

The last time the ILA went on strike was in the fall of 1977. That action lasted for just over two months until the end of November, with the ILA ultimately securing new wage and fringe benefit increases.

By Garry Boulard

Photo Courtesy of Unsplash