The University of Nevada, Las Vegas, claims that a three-year-old student recreation facility at its main campus fails to meet some seismic requirements under the 2002 Uniform Building Code. The structure remains open, but a warning notice is posted.

Designed by the Phoenix office of DMJM Design, a unit of AECOM, with St. Louis-based Hastings+Chivetta Architects Inc., the building is likely to end up in court. Bennett & Jimenez Inc., Las Vegas, which has since shut down, was the structural engineer. Phoenix-based Kitchell Contractors was the construction manager at-risk under a $43.9-million guaranteed-maximum-price contract.

The 70-ft-tall, steel-moment framed structure has an aluminum-framed glass curtain wall, 10-ft roof cantilever overhangs, 100-ft clear spans and bow-tie roof trusses. It’s sheathed in a combination of block, glass, precast and metal panels.

Roof leaks and cracked and buckling floor tiles have also been a problem. The university has since solicited request-for-proposals for building design and repair costs, which will be included as part of the seismic repair’s scope of work.

On Feb. 8, Kitchell and UNLV signed a binding arbitration agreement over cost overruns related to re-manufacturing new structural steel, among other things. Kitchell had sought $9 million; it got $2.7 million.

In 2008, the university hired structural engineer Filip C. Filippou, and he produced a report. “Because of the choice of a flexible structural system for resisting lateral forces, the displacements are relatively large,” says Filippou. He blames the “incompatibility” between the flexible and rigid structural components for the problem.

“We feel…we were the victim of severe professional malpractice” by the design team, says Richard Linstrom, vice president and counsel for UNLV.

AECOM says it’s trying to solve the problem. “We have on multiple occasions offered our assistance to UNLV in resolving the issues they have faced on this project, and we remain willing to assist,” says AECOM’s spokesman in an e-mail statement. “However, we do not agree with all of UNLV’s assertions.”

The project will rebuild the Congress Parkway interchange, which connects Interstate 290 to the north-south leg of Chicago’s Wacker Drive, the double-decker downtown artery made famous in the movie “The Blues Brothers.”

After opening the initial round of bids from three prominent Chicago contractors on Feb. 11, the city disqualified two, then rejected the third for being too expensive. The lowest bid, at $73 million, came from a joint venture of F.H Paschen and Cabo Construction Corp. That bid was rejected because the company submitted a bid deposit of $50,000 instead of the required 5%, or $3.6 million. The city engineer’s estimate was about $100 million.

The next-lowest bid, $78 million, was submitted by James McHugh Construction Co. The bid was rejected, says Shannon Andrews, spokeswoman for Chicago’s Dept. of Procurement Services, because McHugh didn’t sign a required affirmative-action compliance plan.

The remaining bid, $85 million, came via Walsh Construction Co. The city rejected all three. Walsh subsequently filed a lawsuit claiming it should have been declared the winner, but the city’s rejection of all three bids eliminated the basis for the legal action. The contractors have either not returned ENR’s phone calls or declined to comment.

On April 3, the city will open new bids and expects to award the project shortly thereafter. Work on the two-year reconstruction is expected to begin sometime in June. Rebuilding the interchange will reconfigure ramps to make traffic flow more smoothly and safely. It will also create 3 acres of new green space.

Wacker Drive is a two-level viaduct whose upper level provides six lanes of normal traffic at street level. Its lower level offers express travel for through traffic and access to area buildings for delivery vehicles. Intermittent, center-lane ramps connect the upper and lower levels. About 60,000 vehicles use the drive daily. It is home to a number of Chicago landmarks, including the Willis (formerly Sears) Tower.

Reconstructing the Congress interchange is one of three major projects that together will completely rebuild 1.2 mi of Wacker Drive’s 55-year-old, north-south leg. Its east-west leg was rebuilt in 2002 at a cost of about $200 million. The north-south rebuild is funded for $366 million.

The other two phases will rebuild both levels of the road, add more than a foot of overhead clearance to the lower level, separate the lower level’s through-traffic lanes from the delivery lanes, improve utilities throughout the corridor and replace many of the center ramps with landscaped medians at street level.

T.Y. Lin International designed the new interchange. Alfred Benesch & Co. is designing the first section of Wacker Drive that will be reconstructed. A designer for the second half of the new Wacker Drive has not yet been named.

Chicago Dept. of Transportation says it expects to bid out relocation of underground utilities in April or May of this year, with the work lasting until the end of the year. Bids to reconstruct the northern half of the Wacker Drive project will be solicited this September or October, says Andrews, with work starting in January 2011 and continuing for a year.

No bid date has been set for the contract to reconstruct the southern half of the Wacker Drive project, but the work is expected to run through all of 2012.

Rocky economic times, green infrastructure, lean construction and helping the industry be heard were themes at the Associated General Contractors of America convention in Orlando on March 17-20.

AGC has to be about “the industry, not about the politics,” says AGC’s new president, Ted Aadland, CEO of Aadland Evans Construction Inc., Portland, Ore. “We can’t afford to be a partisan organization. We need to work with elected officials in both parties on the issues.” Aadland said AGC is like “the sleeping giant”–members can “wake up” to influence those who make codes and regulations and reach out to other construction associations to “help the industry speak as one resounding voice.”

Collaborative activities like a coalition with the manufacturing and energy sectors were among the highlights called out by J. Doug Pruitt, chairman and CEO of Sundt Construction, Phoenix, as he looked back at his past year as AGC president. On March 17, AGC signed a partnership agreement with the Manufacturing Institute, an affiliate of the National Association of Manufacturers, to advocate for alternative pathways to graduation for the nation’s at-risk youth among other efforts. “We have to be loud and vocal,” Pruitt said.

The next generation of employees will expect companies to have environmentally friendly practices, said Jan Berman, president of MechoShade Systems Inc., New York City. In one of several panels addressing green issues, he noted that just as the Americans With Disabilities Act transformed from being an added factor to being integral in design and construction, so will Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design standards.

Scott Snelling, a bridge engineer with New York City-based Hardesty and Hanover, noted national efforts under way to create LEED-like rating systems for bridges and roads. Dominique Lueckenhoff, head of the Water Protection Division/Office of Watersheds for the Environmental Protection Agency’s Region 3, told attendees that the global market for environmental products and services is projected to double from $1.37 billion a year to $2.74 billion by 2020.

In the current economic climate, the conference included workshops on how contractors can avoid work stoppage and payment delays with owners and pursue strategies for recovering money if an owner defaults on a project. Because lien laws vary by state, contractors should adopt problem-avoidance strategies in drafting contracts and managing risk, said Holland & Knight’s Stephen Shapiro. Those include careful preparation of payment applications, insisting on proof of owner financing and enforcing contract provisions.

The scramble for work can lead contractors to let their guard down, but they need to be even more vigilant now to assure they will be paid for their work, says Robert Burns, an attorney and partner with Stinson Morrison Hecker LLP, Wichita, Kan.

The convention, which drew 2,400 attendees, included the second session of AGC’s newly formed Lean Construction Forum. Chairman Chuck Greco, CEO of Houston-based Linbeck Group, said the multidisciplinary forum is working on a curriculum for teaching lean construction techniques that involves 92 hours of instruction and bronze, silver and gold levels of certification. The forum’s next session will be at the AGC Building Division meeting on June 9-12 in Midway, Utah.