While the overall construction market looks quite healthy, some segments definitely stand out more than others. Over the past few years, EM has reported on the construction of plenty of trophy jobs like the 1,000-ft-plus office buildings or condo towers changing the skyline in cities like Chicago, New York and San Francisco, and all sorts of live-work-play, mixed-use projects reshaping cities and suburbs throughout the United States. When Electrical Marketing’s editors looked at 100-plus construction projects valued at $100 million or more (total contract value) on the drawing boards or that broke ground in 1Q 2018, we were particularly impressed with the number of airports and rail projects now on the radar. We list more than 40 of these projects in the chart on the next page (click View the Full List at the bottom) — 22 big airport projects and 27 rail projects. While most of the airport projects listed are either fully approved or underway, there’s a few breathtaking rail projects in the early concept stage, like the $15 billion plan for a bullet train from Dallas to Houston; the $20 billion-plus idea for high-speed rail from Vancouver, British Columbia, to Seattle, WA, and Portland, OR; and the proposals for an underground high-speed line from O’Hare Airport to downtown Chicago.
The rail projects that seem to gain traction the fastest are light rail and/or streetcar lines. We counted at least 13 of them in various stages of development, including the expansion of well-established light-rail lines such as D.C.’s Metro; San Francisco’s BART; and Boston’s Green Line. New projects are being considered, too, including a light-rail line from downtown Minneapolis to the airport.
A good rough rule of thumb is that electrical work accounts for 10% of a project’s value, but that estimate varies depending on the electrical content in a project.