By mid-December the bidding calendar is usually pretty blank most years. The volume of year-end activity isn’t significantly higher in 2017 but, with what we know is in the hopper, there are a number of plum opportunities on the streets.

On the small but interesting side, bids are being taken from A. Martini & Co., Franjo and Rycon for the 20,000 square foot TI for Delphi Automotive in RIDC Park in O’Hara. Based upon similar fit-outs of their autonomous vehicle competitors, this project won’t be a multi-million job for the winner; but with Delphi’s growth plans, it won’t hurt to get positioned as their contractor. Franjo parlayed a couple small projects for Uber into tens of millions in construction over the past couple years.

Poole Anderson, Franjo and BRIDGES are among the contractors pricing the $30 million Crossings senior living community Smith Packett has planned for Indiana Township. The project has 154 units of independent and assisted living, plus 40 memory care beds. A similar project, the Salina of Cranberry, is being budgeted at the Village of Cranberry Woods. That senior community is being developed by the Formation Group from Atlanta. When these two projects start construction, some $250 million in senior living apartments will be underway in metro Pittsburgh

Another combined cycle power plant is nearing construction in the region. The 1,000 MW, $600 million Renaissance Energy Center will be built by APV at the Hatfield’s Ferry site near Carmichaels in Greene County. Siemens is reported to be the EPC on the project. In the commercial sector, the $13 million Tryp Hotel is close to starting construction. Franjo Construction is the contractor on the adaptive re-use of the former Washington Elementary on 40th Street.

AHN has narrowed the competition for its new Wexford hospital to Turner, Massaro/Gilbane and Rycon/Yates. A decision is expected before the holidays.

A lot has been made about the boom in hospital construction over the past month (and for good reason). It’s worth noting that very quietly the energy and power industries have been in the midst of a boom of similar proportions. Work is underway at the new $893 million Hickory Run Energy Center outside New Castle, a combined-cycle power plant being developed by a consortium led by Tyr Energy, with Kiewitt Power Constructors as the EPC. Kiewitt is also the EPC on the CPV 1050MW combined-cycle plant located outside Johnstown, a $700 million gas-fired plant that should be under construction for the next 2 years. Work should wrap up in 2018 on 2 other plants, the $780 million Tenaska Energy project in Westmoreland County and the $900 million Lordstown plant in OH. The Lordstown project is phase one of two. Not far from Lordstown, near Wellsville, a $1.1 billion combined-cycle plant is going through the final planning stages. That plant is known as the South Field Energy Station.

All of these projects are a result of the economics and proximity to the shale gas in the Appalachian region. That plentiful supply is also one of the reasons Shell is building its cracker in Monaca. To meet the ethane demands of the petrochemical industry, midstream developers are underway with 2 more gas processing plants near Burgettstown. Energy Transfer Partners is about a year into the $1.5 billion Revolution plant and MarkWest should soon start construction on the Harmon Creek plant, which should run at least $500 million. While little is written about these projects, the demands for labor are significant. Similar gas processing plants built over the past decade have consumed more than 100 electricians and 200 steamfitters. Those are big numbers in a region with a tight labor market.

While the bidding market is quiet ahead of the holiday, the hospital market is making some noise. AHN has been moving ahead with several of its cancer centers. The most recent to be lined up is the center planned for the Forbes Regional campus in Monroeville. Rycon Construction was awarded that 60,000 sq. ft., $20 million facility.  PJ Dick was selected to build a smaller facility, a 30,000 sq. ft. cancer center, at the St. Vincent campus in Erie. AHN has also issued the RFP for its new $200 million+ hospital in Pine Township, adjacent to the Wexford Wellness Pavilion. Proposing on that project are Mascaro/PJ Dick, Massaro/Gilbane, Turner, Whiting-Turner and Rycon/Yates.

South of Pittsburgh, WVUH awarded a contract to Mosites Construction for the $6 million fitout of the 8th floor at the Ruby Hospital Tower. In non-hospital news, CMU is taking proposals from Jendoco, Landau, Mascaro, PJ Dick and Rycon on renovations to Posner Hall and Warner Hall. The projects combined will be roughly $22 million. Trammel Crow broke ground on the $60 million Station Square Apartments. The 310-unit complex will be built by Rycon Construction. Bids will be taken from A. Martini & Co., Landau, Nello, Volpatt and Waller Construction on a renovation of First Presbyterian Church in Washington, PA.

After putting forth two dawdling bills to update Pennsylvania’s building code adoption process, the legislature moved like lightning yesterday to unexpectedly pass House Bill 409 (read the bill here.) The bill had only one “nay” vote but that shouldn’t be viewed as an indication of its quality.

Neither proponents nor opponents of the bill were thrilled about it. HB409 was necessary because PA continues to use the 2009 code, a version which would no longer be supported by the International Code Council (ICC), and because its adoption process was terribly broken. PA’s Uniform Construction Code (UCC) is adopted by a review committee that is politically-appointed and has rules that make revising and adopting the updated ICC provisions onerous. HB409 sets rules about adoption of the 2015 and some of the 2012 standards, and helps to fix the rules for adopting future revisions. There are problems. The legislation extends the mandatory review of the UCC from every three years to 4.5 years. The ICC updates building codes every three years, meaning PA can ignore ICC updates until the succeeding update is halfway completed. In two cycles, PA will be three versions behind again. HB409 also continues the mandate that no municipality (except Philadelphia) may opt to adopt higher standards in lieu of the UCC.

It’s important to remember that the UCC is not a best practices document. Building codes are minimum standards. In the case of life safety, you would hope that those minimum standards are more rigorous than, say, the standards that UCC has for energy; but the code is something less than cutting edge. Because of PA’s ponderous process, the current UCC – 2009 standards – includes processes and technologies that were in place when the review for 2009 began in 2006. That means technology entering the market in the past decade doesn’t meet PA codes. HB409 will help with that but the next mandated review will be in 2022 so technology developed since the 2015 review process began in 2012 won’t be included until it is a decade old.

For Pittsburgh, the worst part of the legislation is that it denies municipalities the option to adopt newer codes. Because of Philadelphia’s overwhelming lobbying and political clout, that city won exemption; but Pittsburgh did not. Many of Pittsburgh’s commercial buildings are already being built and renovated to standards that far exceed PA’s UCC but the city misses out on the opportunity to codify higher standards for energy, water and life safety. Reaching a middle ground gets legislation passed (and there’s very little of that going on) but it doesn’t move the Commonwealth forward.

Very little project news: Penn State selected Clayco as design/builder for its $35 million West Campus Parking Garage at the Hershey Medical Center campus. Allegheny Health Network selected the Mascaro/Stantec team to design and build its $15 million, 30,000 square foot cancer center in Butler.