A new report on the socio-economic situation in Gaza from the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) has established a baseline for rebuilding as a cease-fire deal that would end the seven-month Israel-Hamas war continues to be up in the air. The findings lay out the most realistic timeline for... View full entry
New York City construction worker fatalities have declined to record lows, according to a new report released by the NYC Department of Buildings. Construction-related deaths are now at their lowest point in the past decade despite an increase in injuries at job sites for the third consecutive... View full entry
Curator Carlo Ratti has announced the title and theme for next year’s Venice Architecture Biennale. The 19th International Architectural Exhibition will advance under the banner Intelligens. Natural. Artificial. Collective., a portmanteau title representing different forms of intelligence... View full entry
Fossil fuels will be banned from new and remodeled federal buildings under a rule finalized by the Department of Energy this week.
The rule stems from the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007 (EISA). Section 433 of that law says new federal buildings and those undergoing major renovations have to phase out "fossil fuel-generated energy consumption" by 2030. But that provision never went into effect because the Energy Department failed to finalize regulations, until now.
— NPR
All buildings (and vehicles) owned by the U.S. Government are currently under mandate to run on renewable energy by 2050. The EISA mandate was not fully effected until now because the DoE never finalized its regulations, NPR reported a year ago. Related on Archinect: Biden administration... View full entry
Snøhetta has announced a new regeneration project with the Japanese private environmental agency BOND. The scheme for a yet-unnamed national park has several planned outcomes aimed a different social and environmental issues in Japan, which is experiencing a crisis of aging and still recovering... View full entry
Zaha Hadid Architects has updated its progress on the Western Sydney International Airport project with Cox Architecture. Construction is now 75% complete on the approximately 4,200-acre design, which is located in the expanding Parkland City region. The project cost is equal to $4 billion USD... View full entry
Renzo Piano Building Workshop (RPBW) has released early concept designs for The Center for Arts & Innovation project in Boca Raton, Florida. The firm was announced as the winner of an international RFP process to imagine the Center in September of last year. As stated in an announcement... View full entry
New updates have been shared recently by the Los Angeles Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA), charting progress on the $750 million new David Geffen Galleries from Peter Zumthor that is expected to finish construction by the end of this year. According to the museum's most recent April 5th... View full entry
The city has construction plans for Mount Prospect Park, once the site of a lookout station for George Washington’s army. About 40,000 square feet of the 7.79-acre park are to be turned into one of the largest skateboarding spots on the East Coast.
Some nearby residents are fighting the plan. [...] They say the poured-concrete skateboarding facility would take up precious green space in a city that does not have enough of it.
— The New York Times
A total of four skatepark designs are scheduled to be built in the Bronx and Brooklyn, courtesy of The Skatepark Project (or TSP). Costs for a new park at the contested Brooklyn location are about $100,000. The Mount Prospect Park location calls for 40,000 square feet worth of concrete to be... View full entry
A new project in Detroit from Kohn Pedersen Fox will deliver the University of Michigan's Center for Innovation (UMCI), a six-story academic research and teaching facility that is expected to open by the spring of 2027. Construction has already commenced for the $250 million development, which... View full entry
The 7.4 magnitude that struck eastern Taiwan yesterday has provided evidence as to how the country’s reputedly strong building codes and regulations prevented significant losses of life and property 25 years after another tragic seismic event led to widespread change. "Taiwan’s earthquake... View full entry
The Boston City Council passed a measure Wednesday to shift planning authority away from the Boston Planning and Development Agency, a body that's reshaped much of the city in the 20th century and has faced criticism for the power it wields over building and urban renewal.
The newly minted Boston Planning Department will assume many of the responsibilities, property and staff currently under the old agency, which will retain oversight of large developments.
— WBUR.org
As per WBUR, Boston Mayor Michelle Wu has been adamant about phasing out the current planning system during her time in office, calling it "an anachronism plagued by lack of transparency and misguided priorities." Other critics have amplified her call, arguing that it inculcates structural racism... View full entry
This post is brought to you by SCI-Arc, an Archinect Partner School This month, the Southern California Institute of Architecture (SCI-Arc) is set to unveil Maison de Cartes, an exhibition by Gordon Kipping that delves into the innovative use of timber in contemporary architecture. Inspired by the... View full entry
"A lot goes into how that reconstruction will be designed, how the process is going to work," Buttigieg said on "Face the Nation" on Sunday. He noted that he didn't have an estimate on the rebuilding timeline, but the bridge itself took five years to initially construct. "Right now we don't fully know everything we need to know about the condition of the portions of the bridge that did not collapse." — CBS 'Face the Nation'
Engineering News-Record reported that debris removal has already begun in haste at Baltimore's Francis Scott Key Bridge collapse site, where six people lost their lives last Tuesday, courtesy of the U.S. Navy, Army Corps of Engineers, and Coast Guard. The surviving portions of the bridge will... View full entry
Emerging music artist Taylor Swift has been announced as the keynote speaker for the AIA Conference on Architecture & Design 2024. In advance of the event, Archinect has gained exclusive access to a leaked version of Swift’s speech, which is titled ‘A New Architecture Era.’ Swift is... View full entry