Construction

As the world’s best-known celebrity/activist power couple, Brangelina has forced paparazzi lenses to capture humanitarian crises worldwide, raising public awareness about issues like the plight of Iraqi refugees and AIDS in Africa.

Now that Mr. Pitt is working as a design consultant on an 800-room, “American-themed,” green hotel in Dubai, the 44-year-old actor may put the spotlight on the chronic exploitation of the estimated 700,000 workers powering the construction boom in the most real-estate-crazy of the United Arab Emirates.  read more »

The Bloomberg administration and the City Council on Wednesday unvieled a 13-point legislative package aimed at improving construction safety.

It couldn't come too soon in Lower Manhattan, where Goldman Sachs is building its new 43-story headquarters at West and Vesey streets. From the Wall Street Journal yesterday:  read more »

The Daily News and The Times over the weekend ran stories about Mayor Bloomberg's responsibility regarding the Friday crane collapse on the Upper East Side that killed two people.  read more »

Residential development permits took a 51 percent dive citywide this year, according to an article in today's Crain's New York Business, further refuting the notion that New York is immune to national economic tremors.  read more »

In the spring of 2005, Mayor Bloomberg created the Commission for Construction Opportunity to open up New York’s construction sector to women, non-whites, and other minorities who have traditionally been underrepresented in—or excluded from—one of the city’s last thriving blue-collar industries.  read more »

Developers will complete only 20,000 square feet of new office space this year, compared to 165,000 feet in 2006, according to a report out today from investment-sales brokerage Marcus & Millichap. This partly explains the borough's declining office vacancy rate, whci dropped from 9.9 percent at the end of 2006 to 8.3 percent right now.  read more »

Between the mayor and the major media outlets, we’ve noticed a lot of conflicting reports on the trends in New York City construction. Is it slowing or reaching record-setting levels? When will they stop making so much noise across the street at 7 a.m.? Or will they ever?

The answer, from the New York Building Congress, is that construction spending by the city, businesses and institutions will reach a record-setting $83 billion in the next three years. Last year, overall construction spending was $24.6 billion, and it should be up to $29 billion in 2009.

Residential construction, on the other hand, should be leveling off at around $5.2 billion by 2009. But perhaps that’s because the city already has so many new residential developments--35,000 housing units will be produced in 2007, according to the study, while only 9,000 were produced in 1997 and 18,500 in 2002.

So which is it? We may be running out of steam with residential construction, but that scaffolding isn’t going away anytime soon.

Crain's has the skinny on a New York Building Congress report that says that the pace of construction spending in New York City will slow in the next few years. Housing construction will slow the most--not surprising, one would think, given both the sluggish pace of sales in some parts of the city, a recent spate of foreclosures, and the tightening mortgage markets.

Construction spending in New York City should hit a record $25.6 billion in 2007, according to a new report from the New York Building Congress. Total construction spending in the city reached $24.6 billion in 2006--yes, a record--up 18 percent from 2005. The amounts, including the 2007 projection, take account of both publicly funded and privately funded construction. So, you have everyting from roads and tunnels to luxury condos and top-flight office space factored in here.

Non-residential construction has been especially hot as of late. Spending on it rose from $4.1 billion in 2005 to $7.9 billion in 2006, according to the Building Congress, an increase of 93 percent. That amount should be $8.6 billion in 2007.

The hearty spending projections shouldn't surprise anyone familiar with the commercial and residential markets in the city. Residential sales remain strong, and demand for office space remains high. Also, the city, the state, the federal government, and hybrids of any and all of them (such as the Port Authority), are spending a lot lately on construction and maintenance projects. The Building Congress expects public construction spending will reach $12.3 billion in 2007, up from $11.9 billion in 2006.

Full release after the jump.

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