8 Occupations With Increased Demand

6. Production
7. Construction and Extraction
8. Healthcare Support

The Bottom Line
Online job postings have increased in almost every sector according to Monster’s Employment Index, with computer, education and office and administrative jobs also seeing double-digit percentage growth. So what does this mean for our economy? What’s important to note about Monster’s numbers is that mining, manufacturing and transportation and warehousing are the industries showing the largest growth – with mining seeing an impressive 53% gain since 2009. Any economic analyst will tell you this means an increase in production, a possible early indicator of economic recovery. Good news, even if you’re not looking for a job.

View all 8 ocupations via Financial Edge

New Green H2Otel Hotel Planned for Amsterdam by Powerhouse Company + RAU

H2Otel

RAU and Powerhouse Company developed H2Otel, a luxurious and completely sustainable hotel for Amsterdam, The Netherlands. The project, a prototype for luxury hotel typologies, is shown at the National Design Triennial ‘Why Design Now?’ at the Cooper Hewitt National Design Museum in New York.

Introduction
How to make a hotel tower more sustainable? As a typology, the modern hotel is at odds with the concept of sustainability. Most of the time they are empty and unused, yet they have to be fully accessible, comfortable and pleasurable all the time. Guests usually enter their rooms in the evening. Large glass planes provide stunning views but also heat up the rooms when no one is there. The biggest energy consumer in hotels is usually the cooling system. So, why are the facades of most highrises the same on all sides, despite their different exposure to sunlight? Apart from that, modern hotels are increasingly build according to global formulas in brownfield locations. How do we create a local sense of place while using the particular efficiency if the hotel typology?

Water
Water is an important theme of the H2Otel. Situated alongside the Amstel river, the hotel is overlooking the historic center with its numerous canals, the docks on both banks of the River IJ and, on a clear day, the North Sea. But the name, H2Otel, does not only refer to its scenic views. Water is the building’s main carrier of energy. Through oxy-hydrogen generators water can be used for heating, cooling, cooking and the generation of electricity.

Efficiency
Fluctuating occupancy rates are an obstacle in reaching efficient climate control, especially in large hotels. In order to improve efficiency, an adaptive, sensor-based climate system monitors and controls the indoor climate in real time and for each room individually. It recognizes the number of occupants in a room and adjusts the level of conditioning accordingly. Conditioning is automatically switched off in empty rooms. This climate system helps to save approximately 40% of the building’s energy consumption.

While innovative technology is an important asset in achieving energy efficiency and carbon neutrality, inventive design solutions make a crucial difference in keeping the building’s demand for energy at a minimum in the first place.

Much much more via Arch Daily here.

Send in the Clouds – MIT in bubbly bid for London Olympic Tower

Thanks to writer Julie V. Iovine and the folks at The Architects Newspaper, I came across this project.  It looks fantastic and I would love to see it built.  Although I admit I am not so sure I would ever reach the top to put my head in the “clouds”.  My fear of heights and intended airy and light feel of the structure might stand in my way. This of course assumes I ever travel to London.

A proposal spearheaded by MIT's Senseable City Lab envisions an inhabitable sculpture for London's 2012 Olympics.

All Photos Courtesy Raise the Cloud

In early November, British architects discovered with dismay that Mayor Boris Johnson of London was conducting a secret competition to select a designer for a $33 million beacon for the 2012 Olympics. Brushing aside the standard procurement process—which involves publishing a notice in The Official Journal of the European Communities—Johnson invited 30 firms to submit proposals for a prominent addition to the city’s skyline.

A Guggenheim-like spiral wrapped in cable netting will support the clouds, with much of the structure open to the public.

Called “the Cloud,” the structure starts with a slender spire that is ringed by a spiraling ramp, stabilized with a cable net, and sturdy enough for strollers and bicyclists to mount to a sky full of bubbly spheres. This upper aerie would host three types and sizes of spheres: The largest and most structural are Buckminster Fuller–type geodesic domes; next, cable-net bubbles would cluster around observation decks; and then, blurring the edge, bunches of hot-air-filled balloons create that head-in-the-clouds feeling.

The EFTE inflatables would be covered in a new type of distributed LED that is readable from any direction and could provide a constant stream of information, including game statistics, weather forecasts, traffic advisories, alien greetings, and presumably, advertisements.

Olympic visitors at play in "the Clouds."

Intended to stand 400 feet tall, the Cloud will barely have a footprint, sustainability-wise. Photovoltaic film, whose effect will be magnified by mirrors, is spread over the spheres. And while visitors can only ascend the one-kilometer ramp on foot or by bicycle, they can descend by means of a “regenerative lift” that uses the same braking system as a Prius to recoup electricity, as will water-wheels embedded in the column through rain collection.

The exact size of the Cloud remains to be determined. Taking a page from the grassroots innovations of the Obama campaign, the team has organized a structure that can expand or contract depending on donations. The density of the cloud cover—the number of spires and individual clouds, in fact—will depend on how many people sign on to contribute.

London Mayor Boris Johnson envisions a beacon for the Olympics, and mit's is only one of several proposals thought to be under consideration.

While the contenders—said to include Foreign Office Architecture—have yet to be named, one team is already spreading the word about their entry on Facebook. Carlo Ratti, architect and director of MIT’s SENSEable City Lab, joined forces with German engineer Joerg Schlaich, Arup, artist Tomas Saraceno, corporate sponsor Google UK, and others to create what Ratti described as “not a building for London but a symbol of global ownership.”

The Facebook page Raise the Cloud was launched on November 11 with 1,000 fans and counting, according to Ratti, who would like to see as many as three spires covered in clouds at the as-yet-unselected site. “We can build our Cloud with five million pounds or 50 million,” he said. “The flexibility of the structural system will allow us to tune the size of the Cloud to the level of funding that is reached.” Whether or not selected by Mayor Johnson to be the official 2012 Olympic Tower, the Cloud is certain to attract plenty of air time.

Photos of the Remota Hotel in Patagonia, Torres del Paine, Puerto Natales-Chile by Germán del Sol

This is a special building.  I’ll let the photo’s speak for themselves…

Check out the rest of the photos courtesy of the Daily Dose blog.

NYC Firms and Unions Will Cut Costs To Boost AEC Work

The following deal was announced on May 29th in NYC.  Two months have passed by and there has been no quantifiable increase in announcements of the projects mention herein nor any recently issued Building Permits.  The idea for this deal and subsequent cost cutting agreements are quite an achievement and should begin to payoff for the local economy and AEC professionals.  I will continue to monitor the situation for you.

Here’s the announcement from New York Construction News:

In an effort to jump start building projects in New York City and put idle union construction workers back on the job, the leaders of more than 40 different building trades and union employer groups announced on May 29 what they termed a “historic compact” to cut wages of both labor and management and end expensive work rules. Proponents claim the citywide project-labor agreement will cut costs by as much as 21% on the first 12 high-rise and other commercial projects that it covers, representing $2 billion of construction and 10,000 jobs. But some are less enthusiastic about the cost savings, some unions are declining to participate and some developers may have to rethink profit margins in a changed city economy.

The agreement was reached between the Building and Construction Trades Council (BCTC) of Greater New York, which represents 100,000 union workers and the Building Trades Employers’ Association (BTEA), which includes 28 contractor groups and 1,700 union firms. The groups have been negotiating since last October, said Louis J. Coletti, BTEA president. “Contractors would have liked more, unions less, but we’re trying to save jobs in New York City,” he says.

Building trades agreed to no strikes or work stoppages on projects included under the pact, as well as standard workdays and other work rule changes and enforcement. Contractors agreed to cut wages and benefits for management employees, reduce profit margins and strive for “improved project management and efficiency,” among other changes.

Several unions, which were not specified, have also agreed to one-year wage freezes and benefit cuts, according to BTEA. The pact is set to generate project cost reductions averaging 16% to 21%, based on a study conducted for BTEA by Hill International Inc., a Marlton, N.J., project and risk management firm. That figure does not include union wage-freeze cost savings, says the group.

“We have two problems in New York: the financial crisis and creeping nonunionism. This will help both,” said John A. Cavanagh, a former building contractor executive and chairman emeritus of the Contractors’ Association of Greater New York, a BTEA member group. He credited BCTC President Gary LaBarbera, a former teamsters’ union official. “Everyone had to do what they didn’t want to do, especially on the union side.”

The pact won praise from New York Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg (R). “Labor and management are not content merely to wait for a national rebound,” he said on May 29.“Their agreement is an important step to get stalled projects going again.”

But Stephen Spinola, president of the Real Estate Board of New York, said, “It doesn’t go far enough.” He also says savings may be only between 3% and 8%, according to published reports. “We will be talking to our partners to bring costs down further,” he said.

But the pact press release coincided with the May 29 announcement by New York City-based Forest City Ratner Cos. that it plans to resume work on Beekman Tower, a planned 76-story mixed use project halted two months ago at the 37th floor. Reportedly set to be capped at 40 floors, the structure now will be built to its full planned height, says the developer, noting the new labor pact and cost reductions in materials and finishes. Kreisler Borg Florman is project contractor. Others among the first 12 projects that could restart include those being built by Bovis Lend Lease, Turner Construction, Tishman Construction, F.J. Sciame Co. and Plaza Construction. But Coletti acknowledged that not all may restart.

Even so, Coletti thinks the labor agreement is “more the end of the beginning,” noting that trades and employers are still discussing pact details and inclusion of new projects. The AFL-CIO’s Building and Construction Trades Dept. is set to review an additional 12 to 15 projects and the local labor-management committee will review up to nine more in the next week, he said.

One footnote, the city approved the master plan for the Coney Island Revitalization & Development Project yesterday.

Fierce Competition on Stimulus Projects Leaves Surplus of Funds for New Jobs

WAYLAND, MASSACHUSETTS— States from around the country are reporting that bids on stimulus-funded projects are coming in far lower than expected, according to 120 Days Later: How the Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 is Impacting the AEC Industry, a new report from ZweigWhite. This leaves a surplus of funds that states may use to fund projects which were initially deemed to be lower priority or less than “shovel ready.”

With new projects becoming available and only 14% of the $787 billion stimulus package spent so far, A/E and environmental firms still have a chance to go after work funded by this historic initiative.

“This money will be spent. Our analysis suggests that firms planning to pursue these new projects shouldn’t sit still, waiting for the government to release requests for proposals,” notes Elaine Howley, editor of the report.

“We’re advising our clients to invest in developing strategic partnerships now, in order to be ready the moment states decide to move forward with additional jobs. Tactics may include identifying public sector decision-makers and forming alliances with other professional services firms.”

“It’s very notable that the desire to win these jobs is so great that more jobs will be made available. The other side of that coin,” Howley cautions, “is that, when placing bids, firms must be mindful that there has been considerable downward pressure on pricing.”

ZweigWhite’s new report 120 Days Later: How the Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 is Impacting the AEC Industry details the spending that’s occurred in the months since the passage of the economic stimulus bill and explains what’s expected to happen next. The report also provides information on what projects are still available and provides practical advice for pursuing stimulus-funded work quickly.

This is a companion report to Guide to the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, which was published in April and explains how stimulus funds are being distributed and offers proven strategies for securing public work. Both reports are available for immediate download at www.zweigwhite.com/go/120days.

About ZweigWhite: ZweigWhite is the nation’s leading source of business management services for architecture, engineering, and environmental consulting firms. The ZweigWhite team consists of experts in strategic business planning, business valuation, ownership transition, human resources management, finance and administration, mergers and acquisitions, market research, marketing, project management and project delivery methods who collectively produce a comprehensive suite of products and services, including newsletters, industry reports, executive training, business conferences, and advisory services covering virtually every aspect of firm management. The firm is headquartered in Wayland, MA , with additional offices in, Chicago, IL and Washington, DC