The largest manufacturer of pre-engineered metal building systems and components is extending its cladding portfolio deeper into precast concrete stone veneer. Through its Ply Gem business, Houston-based NCI Building Systems has closed on Environmental Materials LLC, the Denver entity behind the Environmental StoneWorks brand, in a transaction valued at $187 million.
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The National Concrete Masonry Association launched a Hall of Fame with Karl H. Watson, Sr. and Don Gordon during last month’s 2019 Convention and Icon-Xchange gathering in Orlando.
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A new National Concrete Masonry Association brand identity includes logos, colors and core messaging, highlighted with a website launched late last month. The effort was facilitated by the NCMA Young Professionals Group, representing some of the industry’s brightest and most promising up-and-coming business leaders.
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The American Concrete Pavement Association’s new 16-page treatise, “VISION2040: The Future of Concrete Pavement Imagined,” provides a glimpse of transportation policy, planning and project execution over the next 20 years. Authors describe anticipated agency or project owner needs; forecast how rigid pavements will serve various functions; explain how the association and allies will shape the future; and, indicate the great potential for infrastructure safety, performance and value if stakeholders invest and collaborate effectively along the way.
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Underground infrastructure projects at airports will be easier for precast concrete producers to bid after release of the Federal Aviation Administration’s Approved Advisory Circular Specifications for 2019. The 717-page document specifies precast concrete for all underground drainage structures for the first time, and stems from three years of FAA and National Precast Concrete Association collaboration.
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A developer of market-specific tools for fleet operators and drivers bound by Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration hours of service rules cites the first electronic logging device programmed with functionality to reflect the agency’s HOS rule exemptions for mixer and concrete pump drivers. GeoSpace Labs timed the February release of its construction-specific ELD with FMCSA’s formal announcement of exemptions for concrete delivery and placement vehicles; it waives drivers’ 30-minute break requirement and relaxes the reset period from 14 to 12 hours.
Read MoreThe 14.7 million wage and salary workers who were members of unions in 2018 represented 10.5 percent of the U.S. workforce, down 0.2 percent year-over-year, a Bureau of Labor Statistics report confirms. The figure underscores a protracted union membership rate decline since 1983, the first year for which comparable worker data are available. BLS calculated a rank-and-file of 17.7 million workers that year, or 20.1 percent of the wage and salary workforce.
Read MoreA case involving alleged False Claims Act violations and Pennsylvania precaster Universal Concrete Products Corp. is drawing to a close in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Alexandria. It unfolded over three years from claims of an ex-quality control technician-turned-whistleblower who is now on track to share in “recoveries” from his former employer and colleagues.
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