Five employees on a jobsite in Washington where a worker died in a trench collapse have been charged with manslaughter.

The jobsite’s foreman, site supervisor and site manager are charged with second-degree manslaughter, while two workers who were buried in the trench and survived have been charged with first-degree manslaughter.

The charges were filed August 9 in Lewis County Superior Court for a trench collapse January 9, 2020, in Washington that killed 24-year-old William Franklin Stringer. Stringer’s family received a $12 million settlement following his death from British conglomerate Renewable Energy Systems and its U.S. subsidiaries. RES and affiliates have also been fined $555,674 by  Washington State Labor & Industries for the cave-in that occurred at the Skookumchuck Wind Energy Project.

The five men criminally charged in the case are as follows, according to affidavits:

Worker Kenneth Phillip DeShazer, 52, California, first-degree manslaughter.Excavator operator Paul Steele Csizsmar, 25, Brantingham, New York, first-degree manslaughter.Site foreman Matthew P. Buckles, 43, Edmond, Oklahoma, second-degree manslaughter. Site manager Kurt D. Schwarting, 32, West Lowville, New York, second-degree manslaughter.Site supervisor Joel Thome, 46, Bakersfield, California, second-degree manslaughter.

First-degree manslaughter carries a maximum penalty of life in prison and a $50,000 fine. The charge is defined in the affidavits as “recklessly cause the death of another.” Second-degree manslaughter carries a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison and a $20,000 fine. The charge is defined in the affidavits as “with criminal negligence, did cause the death of another person.”

Attempts to reach attorneys for those charged were not successful.

What happened?

The probable cause affidavits described the incident as follows:

On January 9, 2020, Paul Csizsmar, Kenneth DeShazer and Jonathan Stringer were digging a trench to install conduit under a culvert. Joel Thume, site supervisor, outlined the day’s work at a morning meeting. Matthew Buckles was the site foreman. Kurt Schwarting was the site manager.

Thome, Buckles and Schwarting were aware of the depth of the trench to be dug and state requirements for cave-in protection for trenches deeper than 4 feet, and they were aware there was no trench box or other cave-in protection on site, the affidavits said.

Csizsmar was operating an excavator. The trench depth varied from 14 to 15 feet deep.

Before this day, the conduit was being installed with a bore machine. The decision was made to stop using it because of poor weather. This would be the first trench dug at this point on the job for installing conduit.

The conduit got jammed, and DeShazer entered the trench to set up rigging to allow them to pull the conduit under the culvert using the excavator.

Due to poor weather and soil conditions, the trench walls collapsed onto DeShazer, burying him in about one and a half feet of dirt.

Csizsmar and Stringer then jumped in the trench to free DeShazer. That led to a secondary collapse that buried all three men in various depths of soil. Csizsmar freed himself and called for help. DeShazer was able to stay alive by a pocket of air and was rescued. He was flown to a hospital with serious injuries.

Stringer’s body was recovered the next day. He died of asphyxiation due to chest compression by the weight of the soil on top of him.

Fines issued

“At one point, nine or more people took turns entering the still unprotected trench to dig out the buried workers,” the Washington State Department of Labor & Industries said in its July 16, 2020, news release about the violations.

In interviews with the Department of Labor and Industries, DeShazer and Csizsmar said they were longtime employees of the company and were aware no one was supposed to enter a trench deeper than 4 feet without collapse-prevention, and they also acknowledged that such protection was not provided, the affidavits said.

Stringer had been employed for a few months by Aerotek, a temporary agency hired by RES System 3, which was a subcontractor on the project. The general contractor was RES America Construction, according to the Department of Labor & Industries.

The agency said in the release that the soil was unstable from heavy rains and that no trench box or other protections were in place.

The agency proposed the following fines in July 2020 for the incident:

$360,874 for RES System 3 for the following alleged violations: no cave-in protection, no competent person trained on trench safety on site, no written safety program tailored to the project, inadequate training, improper ladder extension, and no means of getting out of the trench.$184,800 for RES America Construction for the following alleged violations: not ensuring the subcontractor used cave-in protection, not having a written safety program tailored to the project, inadequate training programs and improper ladder extension.

On February 26, 2021, Stringer’s estate settled for $12 million with RES and affiliates after filing a wrongful-death lawsuit. It is one of the largest wrongful-death settlements for an individual in Washington State history.

Criminal charges infrequent

Criminal charges for a trench collapse are not typical, but in the past six years, prosecutors have been more willing to press charges in trench collapse cases because they are seen as preventable if proper protective measures are put in place.

This marks the second case of criminal charges being filed in Washington. In 2018, a contractor was charged with second-degree manslaughter after one of his workers died in a trench collapse in West Seattle in 2016. That case is still working its way through the court.

In July, a Colorado contractor was sentenced to 10 months in jail after one of his workers died in a trench collapse.

In 2020, a supervisor on the site of a fatal trench collapse in 2017 in Pennsylvania was indicted on a federal charge of making false statements to the government.

In 2019, two separate cases in Virginia and in New York City resulted in manslaughter charges against contractors. That same year, the owner of a Boston drain service company was sentenced to two years in prison for the deaths of two of his workers during a 2016 trench collapse in the city.

Other criminal cases in trench collapses have occurred in Santa Clara County, California (2015), New York City (2016), Ventura County, California (2017), two cases in Pennsylvania (2018), and Morris County, New Jersey (2018). 

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In construction, asset lifecycle management is critical to ensuring trucks and heavy equipment are performing well so critical projects finish on time. These vehicles need to be in the right locations and deliver maximum value compared to hourly operating and owning costs. But with many moving parts to monitor, asset lifecycle management can easily overwhelm project owners or site managers—especially if they oversee equipment across multiple job sites.

For OEMs and their dealers supplying the equipment, there’s an open opportunity to support these customers and provide asset lifecycle management as a recurring, value-added service through telematics. By outfitting trucks and heavy equipment with the latest sensors and Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) devices, it’s possible to collect comprehensive data on equipment usage, health, performance, and location.

When data is shared in real-time through the cloud and displayed in an asset management application, OEMs and dealers can gain enhanced visibility across a customer’s connected fleet along with insights to guide smarter equipment maintenance, deployment and replacement decisions. Let’s look at how telematics solutions can optimize asset lifecycle management across these three areas and how the technology provides a win-win for both equipment dealers and owners.

Scheduling and managing proactive maintenance

Telematics data on equipment usage, such as hours of use and operator behavior, can help proactively determine when a heavy construction vehicle requires maintenance or repair. Alerts can be set up to automatically notify relevant personnel — within the equipment owner’s and dealer’s organization — if a device detects an engine fault or any type of vehicle maintenance or service trigger.

Combined with a third-party maintenance management solution, these insights enable dealers to develop equipment maintenance schedules and drive work orders from initiation to completion. After service is complete on a truck or piece of heavy equipment, the installed sensors and devices can provide additional operating data to confirm that the job was done properly before deployment back in the field.

For the owners, proactive maintenance scheduling and upkeep based on equipment usage reduces the risks of a vehicle breaking down in the middle of operations on a construction site to maximize uptime. For OEMs and their dealers, it’s a great way to stay in front of their customers and drive additional revenue streams through parts and labor during service.

sset location tracking 

Telematics devices with GPS tracking displayed via an asset management application can provide owners and dealers with insights into the precise location of all assets across their connected fleet, including at multiple job sites. Meaning, if a vehicle requires maintenance, it can be located quickly and routed to the dealer for service.

Similar to when consumers track an e-commerce order, an asset management solution will provide a projected travel time for the asset and notification when it successfully reaches the dealership’s service area. Likewise, owners can track serviced vehicles while they’re in transit back to the lot or job site.

Location tracking provides an additional layer of security over a fleet, not only when vehicles are en route between the dealer and customer but also when deployed onsite. Dealers can set geofences for the perimeter of a work zone to monitor when these assets enter or leave the defined area. Any instance of unauthorized use outside the geofence — in addition to an engine starting outside of working hours — can be identified in advance as preventive measures to protect owners and their fleets against theft.

Determining when it’s time 

In addition to determining when an asset is due for repair, it’s also important to know when it’s nearing the end of life and time for a replacement. This is when heavy equipment Lifecycle Cost Analysis (LCCA) comes into play and where telematics data can contribute greatly in deciding whether to repair or replace a piece of heavy equipment.

Heavy equipment LCCA considers operating and owning costs, hours of use, fuel usage, and historical maintenance and service data to determine if an asset should be replaced. Other factors can impact the decision as well, such as the equipment’s resell value and new capabilities available on newer models. With the customer’s best interest in mind, dealers can inform them when it’s time to replace a piece of equipment before it becomes a diminishing asset.

Another critical aspect of asset lifecycle management that can influence new purchase decisions is equipment utilization. Suppose telematics data shows a customer is using one asset more heavily than another. In that case, it may indicate the need for an additional resource to minimize wear and tear and risks for delays or downtime if the equipment requires maintenance. On the other hand, underutilized assets may indicate the need for a different type of equipment that’s more aligned with the project at hand.

The win-win 

Asset lifecycle management boils down to maximizing the economic life out of a heavy construction fleet. Data captured by telematics devices and displayed in a user-friendly application provides a means of understanding the many facets of operating and owning these assets throughout their lifecycle. When OEMs and their dealers harness data to derive meaningful insights in real time, they can highlight opportunities for owners to maximize uptime, reduce costs, optimize asset allocation, make mindful equipment replacements decisions, and ultimately drive profitability.

It’s a win-win in that owners can enjoy all of these benefits and realize greater returns on their heavy equipment investments. Meanwhile, telematics-enabled asset lifecycle management and fleet monitoring solutions can become sources of recurring service revenue for OEMs and their dealers.

For dealers who carry equipment from several OEMs, it’s also possible to bring together the data from different brands under one solution as most if not all OEMs who install telematics during production use a standard telematics interface defined by the Association of Equipment Management Professionals (AEMP). A single solution can therefore use the AEMP standard to integrate multiple sensors and devices, providing visibility across all equipment—regardless of manufacturer—to deliver comprehensive maintenance and utilization reporting for end-user customers.

Ultimately, the result of asset lifecycle management as a service is better customer interactions and relationships, where equipment owners view the OEMs and dealers as trusted partners in their construction operations.

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A highway project that consisted of innovative concrete pipe work has won a national award.

The Veterans Parkway project in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, is the winner of the 2021 Project Achievement Award from the American Concrete Pipe Association.

The $55.6 million six-lane divided-highway project between I-90 and Rice Street involved the placement of:

More than 17,000 feet of Class II, III, IV and V reinforced concrete pipe.680 feet of 60-inch Class IV and Class V RCP jacking pipe.382 feet of box culvert with a 90-degree bend.More than 150 precast inlets and junction boxes.

One of the more innovative aspects of the project involved protecting a historic wooden truss railroad bridge from erosion. To accomplish this, a box culvert was constructed with a 90-degree bend to collect multiple outlet pipes from a detention pond and release them to one location, according to ACPA.

The project also built a drainage system, while not interrupting traffic on I-90, to prevent flooding on the highway. Crews jacked twin 60-inch reinforced concrete pipes under the interstate, which handles about 25,000 vehicles a day, to save time and money.

Hancock Concrete Products of Sioux Falls, HDR Engineering and the South Dakota Department of Transportation collaborated on the project. Their innovative designs also led to cost savings, ACPA says.

“The adaptability and dependability of the reinforced concrete pipe on this project provided a way to solve complex drainage solutions, and Hancock Concrete Products is proud to have contributed to its success,” says Ray Pierson of Hancock Concrete Products. “By choosing concrete pipe, SDDOT has provided taxpayers with a drainage solution with long-term strength, longevity and durability, that’s also produced locally and supports our region’s economy.”

Riley Brothers Construction of Morris, Minnesota, is the contractor on the project. T&R Contracting of Sioux Falls paved the concrete highway’s surface.

ACPA’s Project Achievement Awards recognize agencies that have demonstrated creative and innovative accomplishments through projects that use precast concrete pipes or boxes.

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A post popped up on an online forum on the Historical Construction Equipment Association’s website.

“Unit backhoe for sale,” it read. “It runs good.”

“And that’s all it says,” recalls Cliff Bridgford of the post that came up about 20 years ago. “I didn’t pay much attention to that.”

Six or so months before, Cliff had been at an antique engine show in Connecticut when a collector arrived with a 5/8-yard Unit 617 with a backhoe attachment, also called a trenchhoe, pullshovel or hoe.

“I’ve always wanted one of these, ever since I was a kid,” Cliff told his friend Ed.

“I know this guy who’s got two of them,” Ed replied. “I don’t have his name with me, but I’ll get back to you.”

The late-1950s cable shovels had been a common sight when Cliff was growing up in New Hampshire, just before hydraulic equipment began to take over. He recalls getting a toy Unit 357 shovel as a boy. “It came with a clamshell and crane hook and boom,” he says. “And I ended up making all the different attachments for it with my Erector Set.”

Unit shovels can trace their history back to Henry Ford’s brother William, who formed the Wilford Shovel Company in Detroit in 1925. It became the Universal Power Shovel Company in 1927. A year later, Universal was acquired by Unit Corporation of America. The shovel segment of the company was sold in 1937 and continued as the Unit Crane & Shovel Corporation.

Two Units for the price of one 

A few months after Cliff’s talk with Ed, Ed called back with the Units’ owner’s phone number. When Cliff called, he learned the machines had already been sold.

A few months later, he was on the HCEA forum when the Unit backhoe post appeared.

After Cliff dismissed the post, someone else joined the forum.

“You know,” the post read, “it’d be a lot easier to sell your Unit backhoe if you told us where the thing was.”

The owner then responded with his contact information, and several months later, Cliff was in New York having a look at the machines. Turns out, the same Unit machines his friend Ed told him about were now with the owner in New York – a 1955 Unit 357 shovel and a 1958 Unit 614 backhoe.

“So this was the guy that bought the machines from the guy that Ed had talked to, which was really kind of remarkable,” Cliff recalls.

The Unit 357 shovel wouldn’t start, but the Unit 614 backhoe would. “It didn’t run good at all,” Cliff says. “But it ran.”

The owner gave Cliff a reasonable price for the Unit 614 backhoe, but Cliff wasn’t sure about it. He really wanted the Unit 357 shovel. He said he’d think about it, and started to leave.

“Wait a minute,” the owner said. “I’ll tell you what. If you really want the shovel, I’ll sell you both of the machines for the price of the one.”

“My two treasures” 

When the Units were delivered to his home in Litchfield, New Hampshire, he focused on restoring the Unit 614 backhoe, since it still ran.

“I basically took pretty much everything off the machine that I could lift off,” he says.

He overhauled the engine, a 2-cylinder Detroit Diesel 2-71, made new control linkages and bushings. He overhauled the clutches. He performed all the welding, machining and mechanical repair. He sandblasted and painted it.

He restored it over seven years, after work, on weekends and on days off.

“It came out pretty decent,” he says. “Not too bad for a one-man restoration.”

It made its debut at the 2007 national show of the Historical Construction Equipment Association at the Zagray Farm Museum in Connecticut. A friend who is an expert operator taught him how to run it. The 614 still resides at the museum, where Cliff brings it out for three shows a year.

Cliff Bridgford restored his 1958 Unit backhoe by himself over a seven-year period.Submitted by Cliff BridgfordLearning to operate it took some time. He had run equipment in his teens for a residential contractor. He later graduated from diesel engine mechanic school. He was drafted and served as a mechanic in Vietnam during the war. After the war, he opened his own auto transmission business, which he operated for 45 years.

“I never lost my fondness for construction equipment,” he says.

But he had never operated the cable machines. The 614 has a fixed-angle, half-yard bucket. The machine weighs about 15 tons.

A drag cable is used to pull the bucket in to dig. A hoist cable raises the boom and bucket. That’s controlled by two clutches and two brakes. A swing clutch is used to swing left and right.

“They’re a pretty quick, efficient machine,” Cliff says. “It’s actually faster than any 1958 hydraulic backhoe was.”

Over the years, Cliff learned to operate the 614 efficiently, but he doesn’t consider himself an expert.

“A hydraulic excavator is a lot easier to operate,” he says. “If you were running a hydraulic excavator, and all of a sudden you got confused and you let go of all your controls, the thing would just stop right where it was. The bucket would remain in the air.

“If you got confused on a cable machine, gravity’s going to take over.”

The bucket comes crashing down.

“There’s a lot more skill involved in a cable machine.”

Cliff Bridgford with his 1955 Unit 357 shovel at his home in New Hampshire.Submitted by Cliff Bridgford 

 

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Vermeer added a new midsize model to its truck-mounted vacuum excavator line with the introduction of the VXT300 truck vac. Outfitted with an eight-cubic-yard spoils tank and a six-inch dig tube, the new vacuum excavator can carry up to 800 gallons of water.

With an overall height of 11.5 feet, the new machine is one of the lightest truck vacs on the market and is designed for contractors who drill multiple holes per setup and need large volumes of drilling fluid. The VXT300 also represents a new generation of vac trucks for Vermeer which will replace the VXT8 Mega series.

A Kenworth T370 truck chassis with a 350-horsepower diesel engine and 6-speed 3000 RDS Allison transmission undergird the vacuum system. The truck’s PTO powers a Roots 624 vacuum blower that generates a maximum flow of 3,500 cfm and suction pressure of 18 inches/mercury. For crew efficiency, the PTO also allows the vac to keep running while repositioning the truck between holes on jobs where multiple holes are being excavated.

The spoils tank cam-over-hydraulic door and in-tank washout keep things clean with the VXT300. Optional features include a winter package with a water heater as well as an onboard PTO driven air compressor.

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Caterpillar and Champion Iron have signed a letter of intent to develop advanced drilling technologies based on artificial intelligence.

Over time the two companies intend to develop a remote-controlled and fully autonomous Cat electric drilling fleet to create a “drill-to-mill” system that will automate the entire process from drilling to loading to hauling to the mill. Once implemented, the process will increase efficiency and lower costs at the drilling and blasting site, the loading and haul segments and downstream processing.

Champion is a Canadian mining company and through its subsidiary Quebec Iron Ore, owns and operates the Bloom Lake Mining Complex, an iron ore mine located near Fermont, Québec. Caterpillar’s independent dealer, Toromont Cat, will provide aftermarket support for the collaboration.

Caterpillar’s integrated technology will use real-time data, artificial intelligence and analytics, to assess the status of machines, technologies, and material to enable more timely and accurate operational decisions and consistent execution across Champion’s mining value chain. The goal is to deliver a fully integrated technology solution powered by data connectivity and advanced analytics. This will improve workflow between the mine and plant and provide a more efficient end-to-end process that delivers more consistent raw material.

New features enhance Trimble 4D Control v6.2 

Trimble has added several new features to its 4D Control v6.2, including a Geotechnical edition that analyzes and stores data from geotechnical sensors. It incorporates all the hardware and software necessary to monitor assets for stability and assess things like the risk of landslides or the movement of infrastructure.

The new edition is designed to streamline the installation and deployment of automated monitoring workflow for geotechnical-only setups where no total stations and GNSS are required. The software also has alignment-based monitoring analysis and reporting relative to an object such as a tunnel, road, or bridge.

The Trimble 4D Geotechnical comes complete with sensor-agnostic file import capabilities, sensor alarming and gateway-based sensor connections, and data management and analysis tools for asset monitoring activities. Along with expanded support of a variety of industry sensors, the Trimble 4D Geotechnical edition is optimized to support streaming data from two additional sensors: a wireless laser-tiltmeter and a wireless triaxial tiltmeter.

You can’t track it if you can’t find it. GPS Trackit has a solution

Trying to choose the right asset tracking program for your fleet can be like looking for a needle in a haystack. To help you sort through the options, GPS Trackit has launched the GPS Trackit Marketplace. The Marketplace is single portal where you can find, try and buy third party solutions in conjunction with GPS Trackit’s all-in-one cloud platform for fleet and asset management and video telematics. The resources available through the GPS Trackit Marketplace include dash camera video, asset tracking, diagnostics, distracted driving, driver behavior, driver training and gamification, telematics, field service, electronic logs and roadside assistance.

Cat to supply zero-emissions machines

Nouveau Monde Graphite announced that they have signed an agreement with Caterpillar to develop, test and produce Cat zero-emission machines for the Matawinie graphite mine. The goal is to become the exclusive supplier of an all-electric mining fleet for deployment at the Nouveau Monde mine by 2028. Caterpillar will be the exclusive supplier for the Matawinie zero-emission mine.

Deere, Hitachi end resubscribe fees for telematics

John Deere announced that customers with active JDLink connectivity will no longer be required to renew their subscriptions. As of July 14, customers will be able to activate any compatible machine in their fleet at no additional charge. Hitachi Construction & Mining, an operating division of John Deere Construction & Forestry announced the same policy for customers using its ZXLink telematics.

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CNH Industrial says talks are ongoing with the local United Auto Workers union to move its Case M Series dozer production out of Burlington, Iowa, to an undisclosed plant outside the U.S. The move was reported by The Hawk Eye newspaper; an official company announcement is expected at a later date.

“This move is intended to optimize our global manufacturing operations,” the company said in a statement to the newspaper. “Upon completion, the manufacturing process in Burlington will become more streamlined, and the facility will be transformed into a North American Manufacturing Center of Excellence for backhoes, tractor loaders and rough terrain forklifts.”

Six years ago, the Burlington plant received a $24 million expansion, in part to include dozer production.

Case CE announced in 2014 that it would move production of its M Series dozers from Calhoun, Georgia, to Burlington. The Calhoun plant closed in 2015, a move CNH said at the time was part of streamlining measures it deemed “necessary as the company adjusts its construction operations based on current volumes and market demand.”

The newspaper says Case is still in the process of decisional bargaining with United Auto Workers Local 807, which represents the plant’s hourly workers. The union local was contacted by the company about the change July 1st.

Case currently makes six dozer models, ranging from the 68-horsepower 650M to the 214-horsepower 2050M. 

In addition to the dozer line, Case CE parent CNH Industrial said it would discontinue producing its agricultural header line in Burlington.

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Construction projects often include constructing a new home, constructing a commercial building, or constructing a park or recreation complex. They include constructing a park, constructing a playground, repairing an old building, or overseeing the renovation and restoration of an older building. The term ‘construction’ encompasses a wide variety of projects. It can include doing anything from installing a roof to building an airport, pier, convention center, apartment building, shopping mall, or any other structure people might envision. But in this article, we’ll only discuss residential construction.

 

There are a variety of factors involved in residential construction techniques. For instance, several things require careful consideration in residential construction, including space considerations, environmental considerations, aesthetics, local restrictions, accessibility, and electrical systems. Let’s take a closer look at some of these factors.

 

Space Considerations

Residential buildings are limited in terms of distance and, therefore, size, and this constraint must be taken into account during construction. If a building is to be constructed on a parcel of land that is unsuitable for other types of buildings, such as apartments or retail stores, it would be inappropriate. In some cases, the project will be approved but not funded if the land it sits on is too small.

 

Environmental Factors

Industrial construction includes structures that create a huge impact on the environment. Just because the building is for residential purposes doesn’t mean it has to affect the surrounding environment. For instance, a residential building may be constructed inside a thick forest, surrounded by asphalt parking lots, and surrounded by concrete retaining walls. On the other hand, commercial construction includes structures that sit next to industrial factories, power stations, water treatment plants, waste processing plants, and hospitals.

 

Funding Source’s

Commercial construction projects are large-scale and involve financing sources that can be significant. Typically, public funds are used for large-scale projects. However, there are instances when private funds are needed to finance the construction project, particularly when the project is large and complex. The required money is often needed quickly, so commercial construction projects usually have a fast turnaround time. Some lenders specialize in commercial construction loans, although they are more common with large-scale projects. Lenders that specialize in this type of loan are also likely to have lower interest rates.

 

Contractors and Masons

Many construction projects involve hiring a contractor or craftsman who will work alongside the architect and ensure that the project meets all legal requirements. The services of a contractor and mason do not only include mechanical engineering work, but they also include civil construction and structural engineering. A contractor’s services fall under the heading of “mesothelioma defense” since most workers who have been exposed to asbestos are often diagnosed with mesothelioma over time. In these cases, the workers’ compensation program requires that any work done on the asbestos must be done by a qualified professional.

 

Materials Used

In construction projects, different types of materials are used that are both durable and long-lasting. Steel, concrete, glass, and lumber are all commonly used materials in commercial construction projects. Of course, other types of materials can also be used, but the finished product’s durability depends greatly on the quality of the materials used. Since steel is the most common material used in commercial construction projects, it’s important to purchase building materials that are designed to withstand corrosion from the elements, and that will be able to stand up to high temperatures.

 

Other Specializations

Contractors and artisans can also specialize in certain areas of construction. For example, if you’re planning on doing residential construction, you may wish to hire a general contractor to handle most of your projects and give you the time and freedom to focus on other important aspects of your life. However, most commercial construction projects require that the general contractor take on more than one job so that everything can be completed on time and within budget. The best way to ensure that your contractor is equipped to handle more than one job is to ask for a sample of their work for reference.