ConstructConnect Blog

Mass timber construction has garnered a great deal of attention recently, especially when it comes to constructing tall buildings. Over the past decade, tall wood buildings have popped in Europe, Australia and Canada. Initially, these tall wood buildings were topping out at around 10 stories. This is changing rapidly as a race to build the tallest has recently emerged with taller structures being proposed and announced.

Building product manufacturers, take note. As the demand for delivering healthier buildings grows, there is a greater need for transparency in building products and materials. We spend about 90% of our time inside and building owners are looking for ways to make buildings healthier for occupants. Architects and specifiers need to be able to identify building products that are healthy, sustainable, and environmentally friendly.

Technology is constantly improving the way the construction industry operates. Smartphones and mobile apps have made communication and collaboration on projects easier. Building Information Modeling (BIM) improves project visualization, makes scheduling more efficient and reduces waste and rework.

So, you’re a general contractor bidding a project and the contract requires an MBE participation goal of 8% and you aren’t sure where to turn. Maybe you’re a minority or woman owned company working in the realm of the construction industry and want to find more work. Today we’re going to look at some of the various programs available for contractors, subcontractors and construction suppliers that are women and minority-owned business enterprises. We’ll discuss programs from the federal level all the way down to local municipalities.

Heavy equipment is a necessity on nearly every construction project. Unfortunately, they can be extremely dangerous when not used properly. Rollovers, struck by accidents and caught in or between accidents are common ways workers can be injured when working on or near heavy equipment.

There’s no question that mobile devices such as smartphones and tablets have made our lives easier. Mobile construction apps allow you to get instant access to project information in the field and communicate real-time data back to the office or your client.

It’s Friday, so we thought we’d have a little fun and take a look at some of the unique and out of this world skyscraper ideas we’ve come across lately. We’ll also discuss the probability of each being able to make the transition from vision to reality.

Project AME (Additive Manufactured Excavator), the world’s first 3D printed excavator, made its debut last week at the Tech Experience at CONEXPO-CON/AGG and IFPE 2017 in Las Vegas. The project was a collaboration between the Center for Compact and Efficient Fluid Power (CCEFP), Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL), and researchers and students from Georgia Tech, the University of Minnesota and the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

The world of construction often has been labeled as conservative regarding potential advances in technology and technological applications. But social pressures and business competition sometimes forces growth, catalyzing companies to find new ways to appeal to clients, reduce costs and protect employees. Below are just a few things that might disrupt how construction companies operate in the future. In fact, some already have done that.

The construction business is changing—a shortage of skilled labor, growing costs of materials and increasingly complex and demanding projects are squeezing profit margins in ways that big firms have never experienced. A firm that can find new ways to save time and reduce costs is going to have a competitive edge and mobile technology gives construction companies the opportunity to do just that. Here are just a few ways that your construction firm can harness mobile technology to become more competitive.