Archinect - News

LAX Automated People Mover set to start service in January 2026

2024-07-19T17:57:00-04:00

The ever-moving public opening of the long-awaited Automated People Mover transit system at Los Angeles International Airport (LAX) has been given a new target of January 2026. The $2 billion project, which had recently been delayed until the end of next year, now expects construction to wrap up on December 8, 2025. The announcement was made Thursday by The Los Angeles Board of Airport Commissioners and caps a string of setbacks that have prevented it from realizing its originally targeted 2023 opening.

HDR is listed as the lead designer for the project. Once in operation trains will carry an estimated 30 million passengers annually, reducing the need for motor vehicle traffic to the airport by about 42 million cars. It forms a critical component of the $5.5 billion Landside Access Modernization Program (LAM), which includes the new Midfield Satellite Concourse expansion by Woods Bagot.

The top 300 performing firms of 2023 thrived with data centers and sports facilities

2024-06-18T08:15:00-04:00

Data centers, data centers, and more data centers (and sports facilities). Those are the industry's leading commercial projects, according to a CoStar.com analysis of the financial data included in the Architectural Record’s new accounting of the 300 top-performing firms globally.

The agility of firms to quickly pivot towards new market demands was documented as being congruent with the rise in AI, IoT, and other technologies such as cloud computing.

Nationwide, the market share for data centers is expected to reach $418 billion by 2030, according to LinkedIn's late-February report. As such, the firms that performed best in 2023 did so thanks to a large influx of them in their design portfolios. One salient was Gensler, which reports a total of $1.83 billion in revenues. The third-ranked firm, HKS, saw a 14% growth thanks to such designs in 31 different states. Sports-minded Populous (a former HOK studio) "vaulted" into the list's top 10 with a 74% increase to $390.4 million.

Relat...

A ‘hospital of the future’: Foster + Partners opens new medical school building at UPenn

2021-11-19T09:00:00-05:00

With the spiritual and material well-being of its next-generation patients in mind, the University of Pennsylvania’s Perelman School of Medicine has opened an inpatient facility from Foster + Partners and others that is being heralded as a “hospital of the future.”

Located on Penn’s historic West Philadelphia campus, The Pavillion is the university’s answer to the growing body of scholarship that supports a patient-oriented approach to care that is embodied in its design and functionality.

“The new Pavilion is designed to completely redefine the future of healthcare,” Norman Foster said. “The building enables innovations that reflect University of Pennsylvania’s history of medical firsts, creating a truly flexible facility that molds itself to the needs of the patient. Responsive, adaptable and future-proof, it will allow the hospital to continue its crucial life-saving work and remain at the cutting edge of patient care.”

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Architecture firm HDR is reportedly surveilling the activists who oppose their controversial projects

2021-08-18T17:02:00-04:00

According to documents obtained through a public records request and provided to Motherboard, a subsidiary of Vice, architecture and design firm HDR Inc. has been working with the government to monitor the social media of activist groups opposed to plans calling for the construction of jails and highways.

Through HDR’s STRATA team, a division that “leverages large data sets to visually display social and political risk nationwide”, it’s been revealed that the company has surveilled both public and private Facebook groups run by activists opposed to its projects, including those against a proposed $2 billion highway that would cut through the sacred Moahdak Do’ag mountain in Arizona.

Motherboard notes that the company also generated an “influencer” report, which is an analysis of public sentiment on social media platforms. It includes a geospatial analysis that places communities into categories such as “ethnic enclaves”, “barrios urbanos”, “scholars and patriots”, and “American dre...

HDR to aid Florida's connected and automated vehicle technology plan

2019-09-03T14:00:00-04:00

HDR will serve as the general engineering consultant to the Florida Department of Transportation (FDOT) to help implement the state's commitment to the development of connected and automated vehicle technology (CAV).

"Among HDR’s key responsibilities will be implementing the state’s recently developed CAV business plan, meant to move Florida’s CAV efforts from planning phases and pilot projects to full-scale statewide deployment," writes the organization in a press release.

The hope is that CAV technologies will improve travel for state residents, reduce highway accidents, improve travel time, and increase overall mobility.

HDR awarded $870 million California port rail project

2019-08-20T13:00:00-04:00

The Board of Harbor Commissioners of Long Beach, California, awarded a $38.7 million, five-year engineering design services contract to architectural, engineering and consulting firm HDR to perform the final design for the $870 million Pier B On-Dock Rail Support Facility Program at the Port of Long Beach. The project will help streamline rail operations and reduce congestion at the port, which has the second-highest volume of container traffic in the U.S.

Los Angeles selects HDR to manage its $1.4 Billion Sidewalk Repair Program

2016-07-08T14:14:00-04:00

The city of Los Angeles has selected HDR to serve as program manager for the next three years for its robust Sidewalk Repair Program. The 30-year, $1.4 billion program aims to repair sidewalks to comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act and ensure universal access for all Angelenos. The second largest city in the U.S., Los Angeles is home to roughly 11,000 miles of sidewalks, many of which hinder passage because of cracks, buckles and bulging tree roots.