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‘"It’s hard to think about ways to drain the swamp when alligators are biting your ass.’” — Placemakers.com
Immediately after a natural disaster, most residents want to get things back to normal, even if that "normal" wasn't particularly ideal. The story of the Katrina Cottages, a series of 400 to 800 square foot residences that would provide temporary relief housing in Mississippi after Hurricane... View full entry
Las Vegas’s recovery, like America’s, seems to have to come to the wealthiest first. [...]
But Sin City’s recovery shows the enduring ability of America to make improbable ideas work. Some 2m people live in a glittering, sprawling city deep in the desert and hardly think that this is strange. And with its mix of tech-obsessed yuppies, ageing baby-boomer gamblers and thrusting Hispanics, its demography resembles America’s future.
— economist.com
Related:Learning from Las Vegas: a look at the Strip through urban planning lensesWill Zappos turn downtown Las Vegas into the next Silicon Valley?70's Vegas underground home on the market for $1.7MSomething is happening in Vegas; but will it convince people to stay? View full entry
One reason for weakness: many young people, saddled with student loan debt, elevated unemployment and less-than-perfect credit scores, are staying out of the market. — NPR
New research from Harvard's Joint Center for Housing Studies, focuses in on the role of millennial generation in driving demand and shaping recovery. As Gregory Walker noted recently, in broad terms, looking at US economy, it is clear we're not really 'there' yet. Remember, the last... View full entry
The winners of the "Designing Recovery" competition were announced earlier this month. Hosted by the AIA in partnership with Make It Right, St. Bernard Project, Architecture for Humanity and Dow Building Solutions, participants designed disaster-relief houses to aid survivors of recent natural disasters in New York City, New Orleans, and Joplin, MO.
Although there were only three competition winners, all entries that can be easily constructed will be built in these three communities.
— bustler.net
The winning proposals are: Resilient House by Sustainable.TO Architecture + Building for New York Shotgun [remix] by GOATstudio LLP for New Orleans CORE House by Q4 Architects for Joplin View full entry
Architecture firms in the Boston area are continuing their recovery from the sharp declines in 2008 and 2009, according to the 2012 Architectural Survey from accounting firm CBIZ Tofias.
In 2011, these firms saw a slight improvement from the slowdown, which for most firms began in 2008. There were slight increases in the direct labor utilization rate (the percentage of time worked on billable projects) and the profit per direct hour compared to 2010.
— boston.com
Overall nonresidential construction is expected to decline by 5.6 percent — Business First
Reuters reports that the U.S. economy stumbled badly in the first half of this year and came dangerously close to contracting in the January-March period. Also, Market Watch suggests Friday’s report on the pace of economic growth may be so weak as to spur talk of stagflation... View full entry
Three in four landscape architecture firm leaders reported steady or improving billable hours and inquiries in the Q2 2011 American Society of Landscape Architects (ASLA) Business Quarterly survey. The national survey findings reflect continuing optimism for recovery in a key sector of the design and construction industry. — asla.org
Out of the city's 20 largest firms, 12 added architects during 2010, while only four cut their staff of architects. Hiring has been across the board, from entry-level posts all the way up to the most experienced. — Marine Cole, Crain's New York Business
Paul Katz, of Kohn Pedersen Fox Associates, said his firm hired 9 new architects at its New York office raising the number at the start of 2009 of 154 to 163 in 2010-- primary factors have included the West Side's Hudson Yards and the redevelopment of Goldman Sachs' Embassy Suites. Perkins... View full entry
