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...
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...
ReEngineering the Engineer: Fostering Personal and Corporate ‘Sustainability’
When I started my firm in 2004, I had a decent idea of the corporate inner workings. I had been a partner at my previous firm for more than 15 years, but I had not started a company from scratch. Dealing with the engineering registrations was an obvious first task, but I also needed to set up a company and, most of all, a bank account. The logical first choice for banking was to approach the bank I had been using for my personal account. After all, I had been a customer there for 20-plus year...
LEED Certification: Sustainable Construction, Waste Management and LEED Certification
Green, sustainable construction is the way of the future, and modern companies are shifting their processes in that direction. When it comes to green construction, there’s one rating and certification system that holds authority worldwide: Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED). It’s universally used for all types of projects, ranging from interior and exterior to residential and commercial. The goal of LEED is to ensure green buildings are efficient and cost-effective, while also...
From the Editor: Engineering Allows You To Be Part of History
The COVID-19 pandemic has created blocks of time that we didn’t previously have. For some of us, it’s the time we used to spend commuting. For others, it’s the time we spent shopping or attending cultural events. For me, it has created time to catch up on some reading. I will admit that in the past, I haven’t read every word of every issue of Informed Infrastructure. Now, with all this “extra” time, I’m much closer to getting every word. I read with great interest a recent article on the maga...
Executive Corner: Newly Released A/E Business Valuation and M&A Transactions Study Shows Peak Performance
The latest edition of Rusk O’Brien Gido + Partners’ “A/E Business Valuation and M&A Transactions Study” was released on Jan. 12, 2021, showing that industry firms reached peak financial performance levels and valuations multiples immediately before the advent of the COVID-19 pandemic. Revenue growth, as measured by three-year compounded average growth of net service revenue from 2017 through 2019, hit a high of 9.6 percent; and earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization ex...
Thoughts From Engineers: How to Avoid a Regional Disaster
Some 160 years ago, in an effort to remedy the Great Stink of 1858, which refers to a time in London’s history when the Thames River was used as an open sewer, an unknown English engineer by the name of Joseph Bazalgette was hired to design and build a network of sewer pipes for central London. He decided to size the sewer pipes to be twice the diameter judged necessary to address the problem at hand. He wasn’t expected to plan and design for future scenarios but forged ahead anyway to avert pot...
Video: Crashes Drop Measurably After Rural Road Safety Improvement Project on US 521 in Lancaster County
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June Issue 2026
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