Santiago Calatrava said the roof would open.

And evidently it will.

On Friday morning, a 5,700-pound glass panel was hoisted into place as a 355-foot-long operable skylight took final form in the Oculus pavilion of the World Trade Center Transportation Hub, designed by Mr. Calatrava. Another panel went up in the afternoon.

Those are among the last of 996 pieces of blast-resistant glass to have been installed at the Oculus since March 15. The glazing should be finished on Monday [...]. — nytimes.com

work stalled after concerns from regulators over the safety of the skyscraper and its environmental impact and funding.

With no progress on the project in sight, villagers nearby have started to raise fish in its 2.6-hectare water-filled foundations [...]

One villager started to raise fish in March and has invested over 20,000 yuan in his business. “I raise fish on the construction site. It is not in secret, neither have I ever been stopped” — scmp.com

"There were many meetings when the Apple representative would pick up your [iPhone] and say: 'That's what we're building.' What that means is — if you look at the phone, there's the sheen on the phone, there's the bevel on the phone, there's how much shine they have ... every piece of that phone is engineered, and the building is the same way." [...]

The project is so extensive — and Apple is so demanding — that Apple Campus 2 has effectively "raised the bar for construction standards" — businessinsider.com

Builders pulled back from Mauna Kea as hundreds of protesters set up roadblocks to oppose construction of the Thirty Meter Telescope on top of Hawaii’s sacred mountain. State and local police arrested a dozen demonstrators. — RT

This relatively low-tech method is among a battery of tests that materials scientists are using to determine why several anchor rods securing the newest portion of the San Francisco Bay Bridge, the region’s busiest, failed their earthquake inspections. The first alarms sounded in 2013, when seismic tests found 32 faulty rods. They’d been sitting in a large pool of water, corroding. — wired.com

“Our work creates actionable strategies, integrating healthy building protocols, healthy products and green science with design research to directly impact the health of our building materials,” said Alison Mears, dean of the School of Design Strategies at Parsons and director of the [Healthy Materials Lab]. — The New School’s Parsons School of Design

KONE has initiated the first stage of elevator and escalator installations at Saudi Arabia’s 1km-tall Kingdom Tower.

The Finnish lift firm is currently fitting elevator guiderails at the project, which is being developed by Jeddah Economic Company (JEC) and is set to become the world’s tallest building on completion. — constructionweekonline.com

The cranes are going up all over universities. A new student village here, an extension to the business school there, airy atria everywhere, even a scattering of 'iconic' or 'signature' buildings aspiring to be on shortlists for architectural awards. Higher education is investing unprecedented amounts in infrastructure – for good and necessary reasons but maybe for bad ones too. — The Guardian

Most buildings in the country today use the minimum structural safety standards that the government has prescribed, say building safety experts and structural engineers.

"Our codes offer the lowest level of earthquake safety protection. We are designing for one-fifth the intensity that might hit a particular earthquake zone," says Sangeeta Waj, technical director at global design firm AECOM.

Experts however point out that there is no separate code in India for high rise buildings. — The Economic Times

There are ways to bring elegance to 5 over 1 structures, but it requires a high degree of skill and commitment. Only a very talented designer can take such a limited palette of materials and make the resulting building interesting, if not elegant. But developers must be willing to hire those skilled designers. Many are simply not interested. [...] Hence, the wildly uneven — and often uninspiring — architecture in Seattle today. — crosscut.com

An independent investigation into the construction of New York University’s Abu Dhabi campus has found that despite the school’s best intentions and efforts, about one third of the workforce at the site — roughly 10,000 workers — was not covered by the school’s labor guidelines, and thus faced unfair and exploitative practices [that were reported in previous allegations]. — Hyperallergic