Construction Informer

Economic Bellweather Shows Cracks: Just a year ago if you bought Caterpillar stock you were flying high as the equipment manufacturer was generating record levels of orders, particularly from overseas interests. In mid April of this year CAT was trading at more than $85. But everything that goes up these days, it seems must come down, and so the company’s stock merely flirted with $43 on Dec. 19. So, it has announced the layoffs of 814 people at its engine assembly plant in Mossville, IL. The company said the layoffs were coming because of lower demand for engines used in CAT machines. It wasn’t immediately revealed if there was also going to be lower demand for CAT machines, particularly in light of fewer engines now being available.

Equipment Managers Gaze Into 2009 Crystal Ball: People who manage the equipment for construction firms are calling for 2009 to be an “off” year, much as 2008 was. Forty five percent said their work declined in 2008, and 29 percent are expecting further declines in 2009. Interestingly, 30 percent say they expect increases in contract volumes in 2009. That optimism is tempered by the revelation that 72 percent expect their fleet sizes to stay the same in 2009.

Community Involvement Gets Personal: In what may just be the beginning of more construction work being done by volunteers, there is the effort in Tampa to take place on January 30, 2009 where 15 homes will be treated to free home repairs. More than 500 volunteers will donate time, money and materials to accomplish this. This is all under the banner of the organization called Rebuilding Together, a nonprofit that claims to work to preserve affordable home ownership.

Building Inspector Promotes Flexible Building Codes: If you happen to pay a certain building inspector in Chicago you can have code violations disappear from computer records, and even have your building allowances changed. The inspector is alleged to have accepted $10K in bribes to fix code violations and allow one developer to change the number of units it was allowed to build. The inspector was making $89,000 a year, well, actually I guess it was $99,000 a year.