Alabama Report

Commercial construction reaches new high; manufacturing tops the list

By Candy McCampbell

Construction in Alabama is diverse and widespread.

Projects include a steel mill near Mobile, a lifestyle center in Huntsville, an auto-engine plant near Montgomery, a new hospital in Birmingham and a casino in Wetumpka.

And there is a lengthy list of road, water and sewer and other projects under way or on the boards.

“We’re looking at the greatest growth in commercial construction in more than 30 years,” says Jeff Masters, president of the Associated Builders and Contractors of Alabama in Birmingham.

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Leading the list is the upcoming $4.2 billion Thyssen Krupp steel plant near Mobile. It will create 2,700 jobs when it opens in 2010 and will generate 29,000 construction jobs during its construction.

And, as part of the package that landed the mill, the state will construct a $34 million dock facility in Mobile.

Other highlights: U.S. Pipe is adding a $100 million expansion in Bessemer, a Jefferson County bond issue will generate $100 million for school construction and Birmingham recently announced a $47 million mixed-use plan for downtown.

Ahmad Ijaz, economist at the University of Alabama Center for Business and Economic Research, says “industrial construction is picking up, especially where auto plants are located.”

Overall, the construction industry added 4,600 jobs statewide last year.

Auto manufacturing in Alabama is still a developing industry that won’t mature for another 15 to 20 years, Ijaz says.

Getting the products to people is becoming a greater challenge, says Billy Norrell, executive director of the Alabama Road Builders Association.

“There is plenty going on, but we’ve got limited resources to do the work with” because federal and state highway funds are limited, Norrell adds.

The other issue is finding skilled labor. The new projects will generate a lot of jobs, especially for skilled craftspeople, but the available pool can’t fill them.

The Construction Education Foundation of Alabama, a joint venture of the Associated Builders and Contractors, the Associated General Contractors and the Alabama Concrete Industries Association, offers training across the state to workers in several trades, Masters says. It also offers accelerated training for carpentry and electrical students.

The employment outlook for next year is stronger, Ijaz says. The first half will remain steady and should start picking up in the second half, especially in the construction industry, he says.

Poarch Creek Casino & Hotel, Wetumpka. Contractor: Flintco Inc., Memphis. Cost: $150 million. Start/complete dates: August 20, 2007/January 2009.

The challenge is for Flintco Inc. to find the necessary supply of skilled subs to do the details needed in a high-end hotel and casino.

“For where we’re building, there are not that many casinos of this caliber,” says Tim Weatherford, Flintco vice president.

Some national firms are already on board, but he still wants to use local firms when possible.

The job requires 418,000 sq ft of hotel and casino space and a 500-car parking garage. The 355-room, 15-story hotel will be joined to a 125,000-sq-ft casino and restaurants.

The concrete and post-tension hotel will sit on 45-ft, auger-cast foundation piles while the casino will be on spread footings. The parking garage is precast on steel.

To handle the complex communication and electrical needs of the gaming machines, the casino will have 9,000 ft of duct and underground raceways.

The roof will be a combination of EPDM built-up and metal.

Women & Infants Medical Facility and Office Building, Birmingham. Contractor: Brasfield & Gorrie LLC, Birmingham. Cost: $133 million. Start/complete dates: April 2007/January 2010.

Brasfield & Gorrie will construct this design-build, 630,000-sq-ft, 10-story building that covers a downtown Birmingham block. It includes a women and infants hospital, radiation oncology facility and two floors of physician offices on top, says Jason Hard, project manager.

“We can more aggressively manage the process because we’re in total control (of the design and construction phases),” he says.

Two challenges bring a need for extra communication and pinpoint planning.

One is the three-level pedestrian bridge that links the facility to UAB Hospital’s North Pavilion over the five-lane 18th Street, one of the state’s busiest roads.

The other is the construction cranes, already up, that are in the hospital’s emergency helicopter flight patterns, he says.

The hospital is classified as an essential facility that has to survive seismic shocks, and so it will contain a lead-shielded concrete fault with 4-ft-thick walls and floors to house four linear accelerators, a CT simulator and HDR simulator and a spot for a PET scanner.

It also will have 120 patient rooms, 17 labor and delivery rooms, 56 NICU bassinets, 57 CCN bassinets and 40 well-baby bassinets. 

Trussville High School, Trussville. Contractor: Doster Construction Co., Birmingham. Cost: $70.9 million. Start/complete dates: January 2007/November 2008.

The Hewitt-Trussville High School job is a huge project that will replace one of the largest public high school buildings in the state.

On a hillside over the Cahaba River northeast of Birmingham, the 361,000-sq-ft building will include four stories of classrooms and administrative offices, as well as a competition gym seating 2,400, a separate gym for P.E. classes, a science wing and a fine arts center with a 1,200-seat auditorium.

It will house about 1,600 students, with plans for another wing to provide for 2,400 students.

The new building also will have a food court, with outdoor dining area overlooking the river; outdoor classroom areas on the 127-acre site; and a pedestrian bridge over the river.

Doster also is building practice and competition athletic fields.

The exterior will be ground face block and brick in fluted applications and aluminum window and fronts. The fluted block and brick walls will continue inside the building.

Jefferson County Pvt. George Watson Criminal Justice Center, Bessemer. Contractor: Brice Building Co., Birmingham. Cost: $70 million. Start/complete dates: June 2006/Oct. 1, 2008.

Brice Building Co. is putting up a new courthouse, expanding the existing jail and renovating the old courthouse in this three-phase job, says Dan Price, project manager.

The new, four-story, 150,000-sq-ft courthouse is across the street from the jail and will be linked to it with a 500-ft tunnel running from a subbasement level. It will be three stories above ground with a basement.

The concrete courthouse building will be on a drill-pier foundation and will have an exterior of masonry, limestone and curtain-wall veneer.

Like other courthouses being built today, this one has added blast protection through the concrete’s design strength and additional reinforcing steel, Price says. It is separated from the parking garage by an extra concrete wall.

The jail expansion includes adding a steel-frame, third-floor structure to the existing concrete building at the beams and enclosing currently open areas on the second floor for cell blocks. The third floor will have three large areas where the prisoners will live.

Social Security Administration Campus, Birmingham. Contractor: Opus South Corp., Alpharetta, Ga. Cost: $55 million. Start/complete dates: October 2005/Jan. 31, 2008.

This 587,000-sq-ft building will cover two blocks in Birmingham’s downtown area, but workers and neighbors will see almost 85,000 sq ft of gardens on the second floor’s green roof.

That is one of the elements for the building’s silver LEED certification, says Keith Hornsby, Opus South senior project manager.

The gardens also slow stormwater flow and act as an insulator, he says.

The eight-story concrete building’s first floor has a 175,000-sq-ft footprint, the second is 125,000 sq ft and upper floors are 50,000 sq ft.

The building is oriented north-south to gain maximal sun elevations. Sunshades protect the south side, and light shells on interior walls push sunlight farther inside.

Most employees will be 40 to 50 ft from windows.

It has 18-in. raised floors to allow for under-floor power and data cabling and air flow. The floor-level air requires less pressure for distribution and makes the system more efficient, he says.

The building also has a five-level parking garage with space for 1,765 autos. 

Shelby County South Water Treatment Plant, Wilsonville. Contractor: B.L. Harbert International LLC, Birmingham. Cost:  $44.5 million. Start/complete dates: February 2006/February 2008.

Shelby County is looking at a new water treatment plant and to the future at the same time.

The new plant will have three pumps to pull in raw water, as well as slots for three more. There also will be a distribution pump station with five pumps of up to 800 hp each and slots for two more.

With a capacity for 16 million gallons daily, the plant also includes 3,400-sq-ft pump and electrical rooms; 1,300-sq-ft chemical feed building; two-story, 13,100-sq-ft production building with control room, laboratory, plant monitors and controls; 3,700- sq-ft electrical building; 2,500-sq-ft maintenance building; 165,000-gallon pre-aeration basin; two rapid-mix chambers with a  combined volume of 5,135 gallons; two flocculation basins with a combined volume of 330,000 gallons; three standing basins with a combined volume of 2.9 million gallons; and a 150-ft-diameter, prestressed clear well.

There also are four sludge storage ponds with a combined volume of 4 million gallons. The plant will require 14,000 cu yds of reinforced concrete.

Holiday Isle Condominiums, Dauphin Island. Contractor: Yates Cos., Mobile, Ala. Cost: $37.5 million. Start/complete dates: June 2005/June 2007.

The Mitchell Co. Inc., the Mobile-based developer of these upscale condos, applied lessons learned from Hurricane Ivan in their design.

The seven-story building is 7 ft above grade, and the first floor is totally open, allowing water to flow through the structure without inflicting harm, says Paul Wesch, resort development division manager for Mitchell. It could have withstood Katrina, he says.

The beach-side walls are floor-to-ceiling glass, and Mitchell chose high-impact, 140-mph glass on all floors for greater storm and wind protection.

The complex is actually three buildings hooked together with control expansion joints so the 645-ft-long structure appears to be only one.

“It was structurally easier to do it,” Wesch says. “We could not have a floor 645 ft long.”

The solid poured concrete roof is “sealed” with a liquid urethane coating system the company uses on all its properties. The concrete and steel building sits on 1,000 82-ft-deep auger cast pilings with pile caps atop. Floors are reinforced with post-tensioned systems.

A separate three-story concrete and steel garage houses more than 400 cars.