Let's cut the red tape

The feds are apparently abandoning the Gulf Coast yet again. Gulf Coast transportation officials have complained that restoration of hurricane-damaged highways and bridges will come to a halt before the end of the year unless Congress provides 100 million dollars to replenish an emergency federal highway fund. Louisiana Transportation Secretary Johnny Bradberry told a House transportation panel that his state is spending almost one million dollars a day, but so far has received only five million in federal reimbursements. Meanwhile, in Mississippi, Wayne H. Brown, the southern district commissioner for the Mississippi Department of Transportation, told a congressional committee that if federal aid does not come quickly, the state would have to choose between stopping work on regular highway maintenance projects and delaying critical repairs to U.S. 90. It's time to cut the red tape and come to the aid of infrastructure projects in the battered Gulf Coast. Your comment?

Getting a little return

In looking over the financial specifics of the new SAFETEA-LU bill, it is interesting to note the amount of return for some of the non-donor states. Alaska, by virtue of the "Bridge to Nowhere" and other earmarks, gets a 524.12 % rate of return on its contribution in FY 2005. Wow! The District of Columbia, which isn't even a state, gets a 423.13 % return. Rhode Island, the nation's smallest state, gets a 220.02 % return. North and South Dakota, which no one would ever accuse of being high-traffic states, get a 209.84 % and 214.93 % return respectively. Montana, which is also in that category, gets a 219.23 % return. No donor state gets less than a 90.50 % return. But I'm betting that's a small consolation to states like California, Texas, New Jersey and Indiana. Your comment?

New cement plant in the works

There's only one thing that can permanently solve the cement shortage in the U.S. -- new cement plants. Well, a Mexican cement manufacturer is close to investing $200 million to build a new plant in Pueblo, Colo. If the project gains approval from the board of directors of Grupo Cementos de Chihuahua S.A. de C.V. (GCC), the plant could be operational by the end of 2007, says Enrique Escalante, director of GCC's U.S. division. The new Pueblo plant -- which would turn out a million tons of cement a year -- has been on the table since 1998 and has all the necessary building and air-quality permits. The company is finalizing assessments of electricity supplies, material suppliers and contractor customers. This new plant, and more like it, are sorely needed and vital to the future of the construction industry in America. Your comment?

New research facility

The aggregates industry is getting a little more serious about materials testing. The University of Texas at Arlington and Hanson just announced that they will jointly develop a new research center for full-scale testing of heavy building materials. The UT-Arlington Center for Structural Engineering Research will be built in Grand Prairie, 10 miles east of the UT-Arlington campus. The center will have about 10,000 square feet of conference, classroom and office space, and about 20,000 square feet of research space. The research area will contain several 200-ton dynamic actuators, nano and laser sensor and image processing devices. A reaction floor will allow university researchers to test several full-size building and bridge components simultaneously with dynamic fire and blast loads. While the International Center for Aggregates Research, a joint operation of The University of Texas at Austin and Texas A&M University, has been a mainstay for the industry, it is always refreshing to see new dollars being pumped into industry research efforts. Your comment?

Get your kicks on Rt. 66

When President Eisenhower signed a bill creating the National System of Interstate and Defense Highways on June 29, 1956, he opened up incredible businesss opportunities for the aggregates industry. It would take a lot of rock to supply his ambitious plan to create a highway system in the U.S. that equaled the Autobahn, which he had witnessed during his time in Germany during and after World War II. But the creation of the interstate system had at least one negative consequence. It killed off the Mother Road, Rt. 66, a network of back roads and asphalt byways that connected Chicago to Los Angeles. So on this Friday, let's take a moment to remember historic, mythological Rt. 66. Have a great weekend. Your comment?

Sustainable development professionals unite!

In Europe, they take sustainable development very seriously. Lafarge has even created a permanent corporate position. Olivier Luneau was recently named Senior Vice President, Group Sustainable Development and Public Affairs for the company. He reports directly to the CEO. It is only a matter of time before U.S. corporations begin to create permanent positions for sustainable development professionals. With companies such as Caterpillar and organizations such as the Industrial Minerals Association of North America leading the way, sustainability is getting high-profile respectibility in the extraction industries. Your comment?

P&Q index

I will now begin reporting the monthly P&Q Industry Index number in my blog. That means, blogonauts will get it about two weeks sooner than the readers of the print version of Pit & Quarry. So, without further adieu, the latest number is 215. That's down slightly from the month previous, and marks two months in a row that the index has fallen slightly. The index jumped above the 200 level for the first time in July, and has stayed there, despite the recent drop. All in all, the health of the industry remains strong. Your comment?

Materials shortage

Here's a story that I predict will repeat itself again and again all over the country in the coming years. Tight supplies and large cost increases for construction materials are straining budgets for local and state governments, forcing delays and downsizing of dozens of construction projects. In Palm Beach, Calif., this includes water-line replacements, new park construction and road widening. County managers with decades of experience in constructing, bidding and engineering public works projects say they have never seen anything like it. And they see no signs of improvement, which could mean even higher costs for taxpayers and more delays for residents seeking services. It's an ominous sign, and as we all know, as California goes, so goes the rest of the country in future years. Your comment?

Defending the bill

Score one for Mark Pryor. The democratic senator from Arkansas says diverting highway money to hurricane relief efforts not only would slow progress on much-needed infrastructure in Arkansas, but also would hurt the state’s economy. Pryor, quoted in the Northwest Arkansas edition of the Democrat-Gazette, said he remains opposed to the idea of reopening the recently approved highway bill and using some of that money to help the Gulf Coast recover from hurricane damage. “We fought too long and hard to get that highway bill,” Pryor said. There are other ways to get the necessary funding to do the very necessary job of rebuilding the gulf. Your comment?

The Quarry (The golf course)

Mention the quarry in many towns and people think of a hole in the ground, but mention, The Quarry in San Antonio, and you'll likely be told it's a great golf course. The Quarry, carved from an old Alamo Cement Plant operation, is a great course, according to Pit & Quarry Publisher Sean Carr who played it a few weeks ago. Making the site all the more unique is a retail development adjacent to the course which features old processing equipment. Check it out if you're in San Antonio. Your comment?

The Quarry (The golf course)

Mention the quarry in many towns and people think of a hole in the ground, but mention, The Quarry in San Antonio, and you'll likely be told it's a great golf course. The Quarry, carved from an old Alamo Cement Plant operation, is a great course, according to Pit & Quarry Publisher Sean Carr who played it a few weeks ago. Making the site all the more unique is a retail development adjacent to the course which features old processing equipment. Check it out if you're in San Antonio. Your comment?

Lafarge in M&A rumors

Well, Lafarge may be ready to fire the first salvo in its rumored buying binge. Reports out of Kansas are predicting that Lafarge will buy Ritchie Sand and other companies under the Ritchie umbrella, including Ritchie Paving, Application Systems Technology, R-Con Corp., ICF Solutions and C&D Recyclers. The Ritchie name has been associated with the Wichita, KS, area for more than 150 years. No one is commenting for the record. Your comment?

Rock Stocks

Take it from Forbes magazine -- rock stocks are hot. An article in the magazine's Oct. 3 edition points out that aggregates stocks have performed at a white-hot 39% increase while the S&P 500 has increased only 2%. One fund manager, Jacob Doft, says he's particularly high on Rinker Materials. He also notes that Lafarge has repatriated $1 billion from its Canadian operations for investment in the U.S. market. Only one complaint about the article: they illustrated it with photo of a dimensional stone operation. Uh . . . very different animal. Your comment?

3Q prediction

The results are (almost) in. Martin Marietta anticipates a great third quarter. The company says it expects third-quarter earnings to be in a range from $1.61 to $1.66 per diluted share. The company previously had projected that it would record third-quarter 2005 earnings per diluted share in a range of $1.20 to $1.35. The company attributes the earnings increase to strong aggregates pricing, solid volume and good cost management. Those factors, the company believes, will more than compensate for rising fuel costs and the negative impact of hurricanes Katrina and Rita on the firm's operations. Look for the other publicly traded companies to follow suit. Your comment?

All "fired" up

Donald Trump may be famous for saying, "you're fired," as well as bad hair styles, but he also has a knack for high-profile construction projects. Take Chicago's Trump Tower for instance, which will be the world's tallest concrete-reinforced building when it's completed in 2009. Workers on that project got serious over the weekend about their concrete, according to an article in the Fort Wayne News-Sentinel In what contractors called the "big pour," trucks worked round-the-clock for nearly 24 hours to bring 5,000 cubic yards of concrete to the site and dump it into a single hole called the mat. This steel-reinforced opening, which measures 200 feet long, 66 feet wide and 10 feet deep, will be a below-ground level anchor for the 92-story building. I'll give Trump one thing: when he builds something, he thinks BIG. Your comment?

Bridging the gap

Here's another innovative company that seeks to take advantage of the opportunities brought by SAFETEA-LU. We have a lot of holes in our bridge surfaces in this country, we all know that. Well the company, called ZellComp has developed a patented prefabricated composite decking system that it says relies on mechanical fasteners, and offers major advantages over other composite decks on the market. The product is being tested by three states this fall, and ZellComp’s first bridge deck installation is scheduled in early 2006. Now that's bridging the gap between rough and smooth road surfaces. Your comment?

Construction moves forward

August was a good month for construction. U.S. construction spending edged up 0.4% in August to a record high as both public and private outlays rose, a Commerce Department report showed. Construction spending came in at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of $1.109 trillion in August, versus July's annual rate of $1.104 trillion. July's level was revised up from a previously reported $1.099 trillion, the government reported. At a seasonally adjusted annual rate of $667.6 billion, new construction starts in August increased 2% compared to the previous month, according to McGraw-Hill Construction, a division of The McGraw-Hill Companies. The upward push came from nonresidential building, which continued to strengthen after its weak volume earlier in the year. The construction industry's other two major sectors, residential building and nonbuilding construction, were essentially unchanged in August. Nonbuilding construction for August was reported at $104.9 billion (annual rate), basically steady with July. Of the public works categories, water supply construction surged 80%, boosted by the start of two large projects in California - a $198 million aqueduct pipeline in the San Diego area and a $185 million water treatment plant retrofit in Riverside-San Bernardino. River/harbor development work grew 24% in August, helped by the start of a $54 million project to reconstruct bulkheads on the East River in New York City. Growth was also shown for highways and bridges, up 13% in August. Large transportation-related projects reaching the start stage included a $116 million highway reconstruction in Florida and a $108 million bridge replacement in West Virginia. Your comment?