Free Republic

The North Texas rental market is on fire, with properties springing up, people flocking to the city for corporate relocations and builders working to keep pace with demand. According to an article from WFAA, apartment rent reached an all-time high last year, with rents rising 4.9% in 2014 and the average monthly rent for an apartment in Dallas-Fort Worth surging to $919. "Annual increases above 4% are rare in this market," said Greg Willett, an MPF Research vice president. "Because we're such a construction hot spot, the flow of new product moving through initial lease-up normally holds rent growth below...

President Obama on Friday will sign a two-month extension of highway funding into law, the White House said. The measure prevents a sudden halt in infrastructure funding that was slated to begin May 31. But White House press secretary Josh Earnest criticized the stopgap bill as a punt and urged Congress to pass a long-term measure to fund road projects. “It’s the president’s view that the era of short-term patches ... must come to an end,” Earnest told reporters. Earnest noted it was the 33rd temporary fix for highway funding since 2008. The uncertainty caused by that approach has led...

I have a growing construction business and am thinking about using an extended cab long bed truck with a 14' enclosed trailer for tools. I currently use a Chevy Express van. I wanted the truck so I could haul material or debris while leaving the trailer onsite. The combined weight of the truck and trailer will be over the 10,001 lbs limit and require DOT numbers. I know about inspection requirements but what about fees and insurance requirements? I have commercial vehicle insurance but I will have to up my weight for policy ratings. Is it worth it to have...

A Chinese engineering firm that claims it built 10 houses in less than 24 hours last year using a 3D printer has unveiled the world’s tallest “printed” building. The five-story apartment building is on display next to a 1,100-square-foot mansion—also created on a 3D printer—in Suzhou Industrial Park in Jiangsu province. The mansion’s furniture and decorations also were made on a 6.6- by-10-meter tall printer, which uses an "ink" composed of glass fibers, steel, cement, hardening agents, and recycled construction waste to build one layer at a time for builders to assemble. The apartment building took a day to print...

Some are calling it one of the biggest construction projects in the country right now — the $400 million expansion of Google’s data center operations in Council Bluffs, a massive undertaking involving roughly 2,000 construction workers with no deadline announced. “We don’t how long it’s going to be going on, we just know that they’re continuing to build,” said Bob Mundt, president and chief executive of the Council Bluffs Area Chamber of Commerce. Since 2007, Google has invested more than $1.5 billion in its facilities in the Lake Manawa area and now at a 975-acre site opposite the MidAmerican energy...

Illegal immigration has long plagued American craftsman and has far-reaching implications that communities and federal, state and local governments have yet to realize, according to those who have worked in the construction industry. “If you wait 20 years, you’re going to see what happens to all of these houses and buildings,” said Kevin Larsen, a veteran brick mason with 33 years of experience. Larsen left his trade several years ago and now works at a railroad yard. He applauds the federal judge’s Feb. 16 decision to halt President Barack Obama’s executive order that protects as many as five million immigrants...

The housing bust and Great Recession might have scared a generation of would-be construction workers away from the building trades. That’s the strong suggestion of some new research by the Federal Reserve, which explored why shortages of construction workers are emerging even as large numbers of people who seem good candidates for that type of work remain under-employed. A working paper by Fed economist Andrew Paciorek notes that construction employment growth has badly lagged the recovery in the labor market as a whole.

Concrete is an amazing building material: cheap to create, strong when used correctly, and hard-wearing, too. But turning it into exotic and shapely forms can be prohibitively complex and expensive. Now, a 3D printer capable of producing one-off moulds as large as a phone booth could help turn architectural dreamw into affordable reality. The Engineer reports that a collaboration between 3Dealise, a 3D engineering company, and Bruil, a construction company, has spawned the new device. The pair claim that the machine—pictured below—can "create irregularly curved surfaces, lightweight half-open mesh or honeycomb structures, and even ornamental craftwork." The printer is used...

When people discuss business uses for drones, they tend to jump to the novelty end of the consumer market—from the drone hobbyist with a GoPro camera to a complete overhaul of delivery services. “In the press, you always hear that Amazon will deliver a book, or pizzas will come to your house,” says Amar Hanspal, senior vice president at Autodesk, during a recent discussion on drones at Gigaom Structure Connect. “That is a cute thing to talk about, but the real action is in B2B industrial applications. That is where we’re watching the democratization of a broad use of drones...

Sound Concepts installs the largest Elan g! system ever in 43,000-square-foot home featured in 'Amazing America with Sarah Palin' and 'Clash of the Ozarks' cable TV shows. Home amenities include a tanning room, golf simulator and deer processing plant. How do you get your home or technology installation featured on national television? Make it enormous, make it impressive and create an original house that blows people away. Having recently appeared on both Discovery Channel’s “Clash of the Ozarks” and Sportsman Channel’s “Amazing America with Sarah Palin,” this Arkansas residence has many unique and luxurious features, including the largest ELAN g!...

Robotic building by Contour Crafting won the grand prize in a NASA magazine's Create the Future contest.In the not-too-distant future, building a new home may be as simple as printing it out. The process of wielding 3D printers to make homes is in its infancy today, but someday soon you may look out your window at a large-scale printer, swiftly spitting out a whole home under the instruction of just one operator. "Generally, they'll be much cheaper, much faster, much safer and with much nicer architectural features [than traditional homes]," says Dr. Behrokh Khoshnevis, creator of and lead researcher for...

Tyler Durden 01/21/2015 While Crude Oil and Dr. Copper are often cited as economic indicators, as @Not_Jim_Cramer notes, in fact Lumber prices are the most correlated with ISM and GDP of all industrial commodities. That is a problem. Lumber prices are tumbling and are breaking the 6-year up-trend that has 'proved' the recovery. With no CCFD manipulation and less financialization than crude, perhaps Lumber is the real canary in the economic collapse coalmine... Lumber is the most correlated to ISM and GDP of all the industrial commodities... and that is not good for the US economy...

A Chinese company has successfully 3D printed a five-storey apartment building and a 1,100 square metre villa from a special print material.While architectural firms compete with their designs for 3D-printed dwellings, one company in China has quietly been setting about getting the job done. In March of last year, company WinSun claimed to have printed 10 houses in 24 hours, using a proprietary 3D printer that uses a mixture of ground construction and industrial waste, such as glass and tailings, around a base of quick-drying cement mixed with a special hardening agent. Now, WinSun has further demonstrated the efficacy of...

The Obama administration is refusing to discuss reports that emerged early Thursday claiming that the White House is considering imposing sanctions on Israel for continuing construction on Jewish homes in Jerusalem. State Department spokeswoman Marie Harf dodged several questions on Thursday when confronted with reports that the administration had held secret internal meetings to discuss taking action against Israel for its ongoing building in East Jerusalem. The classified meetings were reportedly held several weeks ago and included officials from both the State Department and White House, according to the Israeli daily Ha’aretz, which first reported on the meetings. The possibility...

President Obama told corporate leaders Wednesday he was embarrassed by U.S. infrastructure that was "falling behind" countries like China who spent aggressively on construction projects. "I’d much rather have our problems than China’s problems. That I’m confident about. On the other hand, the one thing I will say is if they need to build some stuff, they can build it," the president said during a Q-and-A with members of the Business Roundtable. "And over time, that wears away our advantage competitively. It’s embarrassing. You know, you drive down the roads and you look at what they’re able to do." The...

In what has become somewhat routine, the United States on Wednesday condemned Israel’s latest approval of construction in Jerusalem. According to Reuters, State Department spokesman Jeff Rathke stressed Washington's "clear and consistent opposition to construction activity in East Jerusalem." "During this sensitive time in Jerusalem, we would see such activity as inconsistent with the goal of lower tensions and seeking a path toward peace," he added. The latest criticism from Washington was made after the Jerusalem municipality approved the construction of 78 new homes for Jews in Jerusalem. Municipal spokeswoman Brachie Sprung said 50 homes will be built in Har...

The United States Wednesday sharply condemned Israeli plans to build 200 new Jewish homes in Jerusalem's Ramot neighborhood, according to AFP, warning such moves would only "exacerbate" spiraling tensions in the city. State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki also denounced the alleged torching of a mosque blamed on suspected Jewish extremists calling it a "hateful and provocative" act and urging officials to investigate. "We are deeply concerned by this decision, particularly given the tense situation in Jerusalem, as well as the unequivocal and unanimous position of the United States and others in the international community opposing such construction in east Jerusalem,"...

A man delivering drywall to a New Jersey construction site was killed Monday when a tape measure fell 50 stories, striking him on the head, authorities said. The 1-pound tape measure became dislodged from the belt of a worker on the 50th floor and struck construction equipment about 10 to 15 feet from the ground, according to Carly Baldwin, a spokeswoman for Jersey City's Department of Public Safety. It then ricocheted and struck Gary Anderson, 58, who had just stopped to speak with another worker who was in a pickup truck just before 9 a.m. in the city's downtown section....

Building site of the first ever 3D printed estate in Gardiner, New York. New York City architect/contractor Adam Kushner begins construction of the first ever 3D printed estate, which features a 3D printed swimming pool, 4-bedroom, 2400 square foot home, and more. The 3D printer which will be a modified version of Enrico DiniÂ’s D-shape printer, will, if all goes as planned, eventually be able to automatically place rebar within the 3D printed house, as it prints. We have covered a lot of news concerning the 3D printing of houses, over the course of the last year or so. Whether...

HARTFORD - A broad coalition of environmental, economic, regional and construction groups urged Connecticut's gubernatorial candidates Tuesday to conduct a debate focused on transportation issues, and to consider higher taxes and tolls to pay for the state's dire transportation needs. The activists put out a four-point program they said the state's next governor must consider, and expressed concern about the possibility that massive federal funding for highways and mass transit might dry up in the next few years. The coalition's key issues are: •Making certain that state revenue that is supposed to be devoted to transportation - such as gas...