This morning, I was on the phone with one of our service providers. There was a question about our account that required me to speak with a representative…And after hearing at least three other conversations in the background as we talked, I’m confident he was sitting in the open office environment that’s become a standard in certain places. For …
Yesterday, one of our customers stopped by to talk about a new mixed use development that we will start end of the 1st quarter–retail, apartments and condominiums. “You may have the curse of being an engineer,” I told him. When he gave me a puzzled look, I explained that a lot of our customers are …
A portion of the ULI 2018 Look Ahead keyed in on retail. Their commentary may best be summarized, “Retail isn’t dead, it’s just changing. Give it some time to adjust.” In 2016, total retail sales approached $5 trillion, broken down: $4.3 trillion from traditional, or maybe not so traditional, bricks and mortar transactions $.5 trillion …
This week I attended our annual ULI Chapter meeting here, where Anita Kramer of ULI’s Washington headquarters presented ULI’s “Emerging Trends in Real estate 2018,” a real estate lookahead produced jointly with PWC. They interview several thousand in the industry, gathering thoughts and opinions combined with data from the field. A few summary takeaways: The “What inning are we …
A couple of weeks ago, I had dinner with David Baker, one of the leading Bay Area architects. Over the years, his firm has designed a number of award-winning projects, but after my visit with David, it seems his passion is multifamily urban projects. He has designed everything from lofts, to market rate and affordable housing, to micro units and senior housing. …
We are in the early stages of a parking structure design for a new project which also includes a storm water management system below the deck. While a number of storm water management systems exist in the market, our design is part of the parking deck and fairly simple compared to most. It features precast …
Many times, prime real estate sits undeveloped because it’s a tough build. Florida is famous for this problem, because of the high concentration of organic matter in their sandy soil. Recently, when a customer came to us, we spent a fair amount of time figuring out how the buildings and parking area would carry the …
It seems the idea of “just right” office space is always evolving. When we designed our office, we carefully weighed the benefits of open space, closed offices and everything in between. In the end, we landed on our own unique hybrid. I’m glad we steered away from a completely open office, as I’m now hearing …
We are in the final stages of a multifamily project where our customer was rightly concerned about sound transmission, unit to unit. They asked that we investigate the use of Cellulose in the walls and floor/ceiling assemblies to reduce sound transmission, and for insulation. Cellulose isn’t exactly the new kid on the block. In fact, …
With the stacked multifamily projects we have built, we have either had a structural steel or a concrete podium and retail, office or parking below. The apartments start above the podium, and wood framing is used if the over-all building height is less than 75 feet. Regarding the wood framing, we have found it is …
I cannot tell you how many times over the years we have been asked to do something intricate with sidewalks, only to come back in a few years and find them not as cool for any number of reasons–cracks having surfaced, outdated brick pavers or concrete that’s gone out of style. Perhaps the argument …
If one is not careful, it can be easy to get lost in your own bubble. While we are in the construction business–service providers–I make a conscious effort to look beyond securing new projects. After all, if there is no capital or product demand, it usually doesn’t matter how hard we work to get new …