Denver’s Union Station is a regional multi-modal hub that embodies everything about Denver’s upbeat future. The Union Depot & Railroad Company built Denver's first Union Station at the city's northwest edge. It cost $525,000 to build and opened on June 1, 1881. Union Station houses the Amtrak service and, more uniquely, the Ski Train, a local favorite that takes skiers on an entertaining ride through the Rockies to the Winter Park Ski Resort.

When you begin a development project, you never know what you will encounter along the way. You think you have spotted a property, and you think you have determined a profitable use for that piece of land or building. However, the unknown lies ahead.

In the 1950s, the construction of elevated and sunken highways marred many cities in the name of progress and the almighty automobile. Even brownstone Brooklyn wasn't spared. Under the heavy hand of Robert Moses, the infamous chair of the Triborough Bridge and Tunnel Authority, the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway (BQE) severed several neighborhoods in order to connect the two boroughs. Some neighborhoods fared better than others; affluent Brooklyn Heights bargained for a scenic promenade to disguise the BQE. However, their neighbors to the south along the Columbia Street waterfront, an area primarily inhabited by Italian immigrants at the time, were cut off from the picturesque portions of Carroll Gardens and Cobble Hill by a sunken, six-lane stretch of highway.

Although it is surrounded by water, New York City offers few opportunities to physically interact with the shoreline. The new Brooklyn Bridge Park proves an exception; its 85 acres of green space and recreational facilities, designed by landscape architecture firm Michael Van Valkenburgh Associates, will span 1.3 miles of post-industrial waterfront between the Manhattan Bridge and Atlantic Avenue, bracketed by the East River and Robert Moses' tiered Brooklyn-Queens Expressway.

Ignoring certain zoning matters during the critical opening stages of your building or development project can be devastating. Property set-back issues and future land-use studies can be roadblocks or temporary stumbling points on the way to success. Whether you are building on commercial, residential, or industrial property, it is essential that you ask the right questions. The answers can make or break your project.

Since 2000, the City of Columbus has been proactively embarking on the revitalization of the Downtown area, including the renovation of several office buildings, as well as the construction of new condominiums and an amphitheatre. The Downtown Columbus skyline will soon be changing again due to the addition of a revolutionary design structure—the new Main Street Bridge. The bridge that previously stood in its place, running along the Scioto River, was closed in 2002 due to deterioration, 65 years after it opened in 1937. Construction, which was initially scheduled to be completed in June 2009, is now scheduled to be completed this August.

Frank Gehry's second architectural venture into New York City is also his tallest building yet. Spiraling 76 stories and enveloping 1.1 million square feet, Beekman Tower dominates the nearby Woolworth building in downtown Manhattan. Under construction since 2006, the newest addition to the city's distinct skyline is expected to open early next year, and it proves that Gehry's signature, sculptural vocabulary translates successfully into skyscraper form.

Speed matters. That is a fundamental fact of the construction business. In my years as an architect, I don’t recall ever meeting a single client who said, “It doesn’t matter when my building gets completed.” Every project has deadlines, and every deadline is important. If the owner is financing the work through a construction loan, then the faster the building is completed, the sooner they can complete the loan. If the owner is a school district or an expanding business, then there may be hard deadlines that must be met, such as the day that the new school needs to be open for students or when the business owner needs the space for additional equipment or employees.

What does the word “Integrated” in “Integrated Project Delivery” (IPD) mean? While there is no single, authoritative definition of IPD, interpretations can be taken from the IPD report published by McGraw-Hill Construction and AIA California Council, along with looking up the definition of the word “integrated” on dictionary.com:

in•te•grat•ed [in-ti-grey-tid] adjective: combining or coordinating separate elements so as to provide a harmonious, interrelated whole.

Love it or hate it, Marcel Breuer's granite-clad Whitney Museum of American Art has loomed over 75th Street and Madison Avenue in New York's Upper East Side for over 40 years. After repeated attempts to expand and add much needed gallery space, the Whitney has officially announced it is headed downtown. Renzo Piano designed a new building for the Whitney in the hip Meatpacking District adjacent to the High Line, an abandoned, elevated railway that has been converted into a highly publicized park.

Completed in 2006, the University of Cincinnati’s 350,000 sq ft Campus Recreation Center, designed by Southern California based Morphosis Architects Inc., is a successful attempt at weaving four distinctly different programs into one comprehensive building.

AEC professionals have a new technology platform to support the old-fashioned notion of planning ahead. Building Information Modeling (BIM) is bringing a sea change to the industry's workflow by facilitating a previously impossible degree of planning, coordination, and communication.