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Chinese state-owned construction contractor will build China’s largest soccer park in Guangzhou on the site where struggling Chinese property developer China Evergrande Group was supposed to build its soccer stadium.
China Construction Fourth Engineering Division won the engineering procurement construction contract to build the Guangzhou Football Park with a CNY2.4 billion (USD328 million) bid, the unit of China State Construction Engineering announced on its official WeChat account yesterday.
— Yicai Global
The site was originally meant for a 100,000-seat stadium designed by Gensler. Evergrande, the developer now embroiled in a Lehman Brothers-like freefall, had already begun construction before the project was halted and eventually taken over by the government in 2021. The new design from the... View full entry
Five years after driving WeWork into the ground, co-founder and ousted CEO Adam Neumann has now hatched a plan to buy it out of bankruptcy. In a letter to WeWork’s advisers obtained by The New York Times, Neumann and his new real estate business, Flow Global, express interest in buying the co-working space solution — but claim WeWork has been ignoring attempts to get more information so they can come up with a bid. — The Verge
WeWork, meanwhile, is beginning to walk away from even more properties under the direction of new CEO David Tolley after announcing an initial list of 40 that would be relinquished in November. Neumann had cited outside scrutiny as his main reason for leaving the company in September... View full entry
A court in Hong Kong has ordered the winding up of Evergrande Group, the world’s most indebted property developer, dealing another blow to investor confidence as China’s ailing real estate sector continues to weigh on its economy.
The liquidation order, made by the city’s High Court on Monday, comes after the embattled Chinese real estate giant and its overseas creditors failed to agree on how to restructure the company’s massive debt during talks that lasted for 19 months.
— CNN
Evergrande’s liquidation could also set the stage for an unprecedented political showdown between Hong Kong and the mainland, as Reuters speculated on Monday. The company had amassed over $300 billion in public and private debts since being ordered into negotiations in 2021. Overseas... View full entry
The American Institute of Architects (AIA) has released a new study examining the impact of student debt across different demographic groups in the architecture industry. The organization used the research company Ipsos to conduct an interview survey of over 700 members who provided insights on... View full entry
WeWork said Thursday that it was going to close roughly 40 “underperforming” locations in the United States and tempered its revenue forecast for the year, highlighting the challenges the co-working company still faces after its near collapse and subsequent bailout in 2019. — The New York Times
The company reported a pre-pandemic level matching 71% occupancy rate for Q3 but will fall short of previously projected revenue values for the year owing to “lower than expected” growth in the U.S., Canada, and Japan. Its own S9-designed Dock 72 corporate offices in Brooklyn were also reduced... View full entry
Evergrande Group, the world’s most indebted developer, was last week ordered to demolish 39 buildings on Ocean Flower Island, a project comprising three man-made islands developed by the company in China’s southern Hainan province, within 10 days. — South China Morning Post
The developer was recently forced to hand over control of its $1.7B football stadium in Guangzhou after spending much of the past year attempting to stave off creditors looking to collect on the company’s reported $310 billion in liabilities, which has recently led to another round of public... View full entry
Chinese authorities have taken over the Gensler-designed, under-construction Evergrande Guangzhou Football Stadium, commissioned by indebted property developer Evergrande, which was due to become the world’s largest football stadium by capacity, according to Reuters. — Global Construction Review
The Chinese government will either sell or take over the stadium via the state-owned Guangzhou City Construction Investment Group. As reported by Reuters, construction on the stadium has been halted for at least three months, in which Evergrande has been struggling to meet repayments on over $... View full entry
Worries about the giant developer’s ability to repay its debt and a total of $300 billion in liabilities have put global investors on edge. Beyond the company itself, there are worries about a potential spillover into the rest of China’s real estate industry or economy. — CNBC
Evegrande missed another round of payments last Monday, setting it back again ahead of Wednesday’s scheduled $47.5 million interest payment. Investors are blindly looking for a government bailout, but financial experts remain uncertain as to its prospects. The company says it plans to go forward... View full entry
New York’s Metropolitan Transportation Authority, the largest U.S. mass-transit provider, is running on borrowed time, facing budget and revenue challenges as federal aid is set to tap out in 2025, State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli, said in a report Tuesday. — Bloomberg
The announcement comes on the heels of a rough summer for the MTA, which is only now seeing its ridership climb past 50% of pre-pandemic levels as it weighs a controversial congestion pricing plan that would add $1 billion in revenue a year beginning in 2023. Interim boss Sarah Feinberg... View full entry
With the advent of the "new normal" beginning to see its effects in the Architecture world, one newly formed industry non-profit is seeking to capitalize on this transition in order to enact a slate of changes it hopes will impact the design community for years to come. Under... View full entry
Waagner-Biro, the Austrian steel engineering company that built the dome of the Louvre museum in Abu Dhabi, has announced its insolvency and is fighting to save parts of its business by selling off subsidiaries. Austrian press reports say that delays in payment and spiralling costs of the Louvre project were chiefly to blame for the company’s struggles. — The Art Newspaper
Established in 1854 as a locksmith, Waagner-Biro has played a significant role in architectural steel engineering. Some of their high-profile projects include the spiraling roof of the Great Court in the British Museum, the dome of the Reichstag in Berlin, and a stage system for the Sydney Opera... View full entry
Ten years after the housing collapse during the Great Recession, a new and different housing crisis has emerged.
Back then, people were losing their homes as home values crashed and homeowners went underwater. Today, home values have rebounded, but people who want to buy a new home are often priced out of the market. There are too few homes and too many potential buyers.
— NPR
NPR takes a closer look at the impact of the housing affordability crisis in midsized, fast-growing cities, like Des Moines, IA, Durham, NC, and Boise, ID—far away from the usual, well documented housing hot spots of the big coastal cities. View full entry
Don't tell grad students carting around six-figure debt, but those who wish to learn from one of the masters of architecture can now do so for $90. MasterClass, a San Francisco-based educational video company, is now taking pre-orders for an online class taught by none other than Frank Gehry... View full entry
Have you heard the latest wisecrack about Harvard? People are calling it a hedge fund with a university attached [...]
Though the exact figure is hard to determine, experts I consulted estimate that over $100 billion of educational endowment money nationwide is invested in hedge funds, costing them approximately $2.5 billion in fees in 2015 alone. The problems with hedge funds managing college endowments are manifold, going well beyond the exorbitant...fees they charge for their services.
— the Nation
"The time has come for students to connect the dots between ballooning student debt, the poor treatment of campus workers, and the obscene wealth of hedge fund oligarchs."A rallying cry for a divestment movement to oppose hedge funds and their involvement with academia, the article discusses the... View full entry
Major public cultural institutions in Greece are on the point of collapse, say leading Greek art professionals, as concerns mount that the country faces insolvency after 61% of the population rejected bailout proposals earlier this week made by international creditors. — theartnewspaper.com
Read also: Architecture in crisis: reports from Greece View full entry
