Infrastructure Outlook: The Future Is Now: Blockchain and Cryptocurrency in the Construction Industry
For a profession that’s been around for decades, the construction industry has innovation firmly at its heart. New technology, materials and techniques are vital in construction, and can create a healthy advantage over competitors if executed correctly. Blockchain and cryptocurrency are relatively new technologies, but their uses are being explored in just about everything. To understand the potential for blockchain and cryptocurrencies in the construction industry first requires understanding...
Project Management Insights: No Buzzwords, Just Good PM Concepts
The business world loves buzzwords. Consultants and marketers thrive on buzzwords. Google, Twitter and all social channels constantly drill the importance of keywords. Words are the way to stand out or be found in a universe of noise. If we ever wonder if it has gone too far or become a bit laughable, we’re not wrong; comedians take aim at buzzwords quite frequently. In the last few years, project management (PM) vernacular has gone through its own transition and introduced new words to describ...
Thoughts from Engineers: Water Infrastructure Woes Hit the American Pocketbook
The COVID-19 pandemic brought into sharp focus a few key realities about water service in the United States. Many millions of Americans worked hard to pay for water service before the pandemic hit, and many millions will continue to struggle to pay when rates of infection decline. The pandemic peeled back the veneer on a lurking problem, the solution for which is far from clear. Due to badly deteriorating water infrastructure, shifting inner-city demographics and other factors, more Americans w...
Executive Corner: Don’t Neglect Post-Pandemic Employee Engagement
For this installment of “Executive Corner,” we explore how the A&E landscape has changed during the pandemic, particularly in terms of employees in a tight job market. Russ Ryan, principal at Rusk O’Brien Gido + Partners (email: rryan@rog-partners.com), interviews Bob Kelleher, founder of The Employee Engagement Group (email: rkelleher@employeeengagement.com). BOB KELLEHER Ryan: Bob, you’ve been recognized as the thought leader in the A&E space on all things relating to the people part of...
ReEngineering the Engineer: Self Preservation Through Workload and Stress Management
If there’s a silver lining to COVID, it helped push us to more-efficient ways of communication. Rather than traveling to meetings and wasting a ton of time on the road, we’ve embraced the idea of virtual meetings. I think that’s actually an OK thing. You still have the benefit of interacting with everyone on the design team, and you don’t have to leave the office. However, the number of virtual meetings has exploded. What used to be monthly sitdown meetings now are weekly meetings—partly driven...
From the Editor: Open Mic Night at ‘The Engineer’s Lounge’
I recently completed two semesters teaching senior civil engineers at my alma mater, Valparaiso University. It was a pleasure and honor to be part of their education—something I took very seriously. But it was a different type of year, as we all know. All the classes were through Zoom meetings, so I didn’t get to interact with any of them in person. In addition, this was my first year of teaching, so I hadn’t met these students during their first three years of school either, as most other profe...
Code Update: Updates to ACI 301-20: Specifications for Concrete Construction
In October 2020, the American Concrete Institute (ACI) published ACI 301-20: “Specifications for Concrete Construction,” which expanded and revised many of the requirements in previous versions of the standard. A notable change was the specification’s title (previously ACI 301-16: “Specifications for Structural Concrete”). The new title recognizes that the specification covers diverse topics, including industrial floor slabs and architectural concrete as well as the minimum requirements of ACI 3...
Executive Corner: Back in the Saddle for the AEC Industry
It’s hard to believe we’ve crossed the one-year milestone of the global coronavirus pandemic. Populations have endured and adapted to the day-to-day changes in societal norms, business practices and lifestyle patterns. As we start to see the light at the end of the tunnel, many important macro forces and challenges are reshaping our industry in dynamic ways. Will these be temporary or permanent? Beneficial or detrimental? Recent conversations with dozens of AEC leaders offered insights into what...
From the Editor: Smart Engineering Urgently Needed to Improve Our Infrastructure
The American Society for Civil Engineers (ASCE) recently published its “report card” for America’s infrastructure. I read through the summary, and this is what I learned: We received an overall grade of C-. That’s an improvement from D+ in 2017, but not much of an improvement, especially when the total investment gap grew to more than $2.5 trillion through the next 10 years. The United States scores mediocre at best (and we’re the ones doing the scoring). Of the 17 categories graded, the best w...
Thoughts From Engineers: All Sensors (and Eyes) on the Water
The city of Virginia Beach, Va., was recognized in November 2020 with a Digital Cities award for the municipality’s adoption of StormSense, a multi-award-winning initiative that harnesses data streamed from a network of smart sensors and uses the resulting analytics in city-specific applications. Stationed along waterways and bridges, these Internet of Things (IoT) sensors analyze rain, storm and tidal data in real-time for purposes of hydrodynamic model development, forecasting, city resilience...
Stormwater Interview with Robert Page, P.E., Vice President, HNTB
Santa Barbara County North Branch Jail Expansion
February Issue 2026
