What The U.S. Can Learn from China to Bring Its Buildings to New Heights
November 15, 2022 —
Marc Gravely - Gravely PC“China’s history is marked by thousands of years of world-changing innovations: from the compass and gunpowder to acupuncture and the printing press. No one should be surprised that China has re-emerged as an economic superpower.” —Gary Locke
Westerners have often criticized China’s ‘creative’ interpretation of the concept of intellectual property, but even its harshest critics recognize the Asian superpower’s ability to build large-scale infrastructure projects at a breakneck pace. America does not want to emulate the absolute government control that has allowed China to build futuristic bridges and airports in record time. However, there are still some things we can learn from our biggest global competitor.
The White House itself has invoked China’s grand achievements in its quest to secure more infrastructure funding from Congress. The administration believes that the only way to compete with China is to spend
at least $2 trillion on upgrading bridges and mass transit, modernizing neighborhoods and airports, and making broadband access universal.
The skylines of China’s largest metropolises are nothing short of mesmerizing. Its grand airports and auditoriums amaze tourists and locals alike. Explore any important Chinese city on Google maps, and you will find a level of modernization in infrastructure that far surpasses American cities of similar size. Scholars have coined the phrase
“China envy” to refer to the effects of this phenomenon.
According to urban planning historian Thomas J. Campanella, China is doing the kind of things America used to do: amazing the world with grand structures that push engineering and architecture forward. The question is, if China has emulated us, can we now emulate China?
China Envy
There are some basic differences between the two nations which make emulation difficult. On the one hand, China has leapfrogged from rudimentary infrastructure to suborbital spaceships and bullet trains. America is at a different stage and moves at a different pace. Chinese leaders don’t need approval from the opposition in Congress; they have total control. If the Chinese administration wants to build a bridge, they just go ahead and do it. Democracy is a bit more complicated, but we naturally welcome the complexities, considering how stifling the political atmosphere is under communist rule.
Another difference some analysts have pointed out is that the current Chinese President and his predecessor both studied engineering, so they were naturally keen on innovation in their field. Meanwhile, U.S. presidents have seldom had such backgrounds. The American public has more often elected lawyers to rule over our nation.
China envy is understandable. Our competitor is home to
49 of the planet’s 100 tallest skyscrapers. It also boasts a million bridges. While the U.S. spends 2.4 percent of GDP on infrastructure,
China spends 8 percent. This was an important selling point for the White House’s ambitious infrastructure plan.
Located in a mountainous region with over 1,500 rivers, China has built bridges of fantastic proportions to keep urban centers and important agricultural areas connected.
The Pingtang Bridge in Guizhou province links two sides of a canyon that are 7,000 feet apart. The spectacular, 7-mile-long Hutong Yangtze River Bridge efficiently provides railway and highway access to Shanghai from Jiangsu province.
As climate change forces us to reevaluate Americans’ preference for private cars and the neglect of our railway systems, the inferior car ownership that was once a disadvantage for China is now an advantage. By 2025, high-speed trains will service
98 percent of Chinese cities. Subways are common in many of them. Today, the country boasts a high-speed rail network totaling more than 23,500 miles, or
eight times the distance between New York and LA. Chinese workers travel on bullet trains at 215 miles per hour, much faster than their American counterparts.
The gap between China and the U.S. when it comes to infrastructure is one of astronomic proportions. A few years ago, Bill Gates announced that China had used as much cement in three years as the U.S. in 100 years. China currently produces 14 times more steel than the U.S. and about 2.2 gigatons of cement per year, roughly half of the
4.5 gigatons our country used in the 20th century. In China, city planners have not focused on short-term return on investment, but on broader societal benefits. For example, World Bank officials were not enamored with the idea of creating a subway in Shanghai; the region’s geology made the project far too complex. The World Bank suggested buses would be a better solution for the city’s transit, but Chinese officials
didn’t listen and went ahead. Thirty years later, the Shanghai subway has become an example of efficiency, transporting more than 10 million people every day. It is as if China followed a different logic, one that often pays off.
According to Mr. Campanella, “We need a bit of China to be stirred into our game. . . We’re over privileging the immediately affected residents. What we don’t do is give requisite weight to the larger society.” China’s modernization has, however, not been without cost. Accelerated construction creates pollution, and not all the country’s massive structures are green or energy efficient. President Xi’s country is conscious about pollution, and it has poured significant resources into green infrastructure projects like wind and solar farms.
There is a boldness in China’s infrastructure planning, a pioneering spirit that we would do well to imitate. What American jurisdiction would spend billions on a new state-of-the-art airport only 50 miles away from a recently modernized one? China has done it in Beijing. In a way, it seems that China is seeing beyond the here and now, planning for tomorrow, and this is something we can learn from our competitors.
Marc Gravely is the founder and lead attorney at Gravely PC and author of Reframing America’s Infrastructure: A Ruins to Renaissance Playbook.
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Surviving a Tornado – How to Navigate Insurance Claims in the Wake of the Recent Connecticut Storm
May 24, 2018 —
Geoffrey Miller - Saxe Doernberger & Vita, P.C.Five minutes after I parked my car, a tree fell on it.
On Tuesday, May 15th I pulled into my driveway, in my small Connecticut neighborhood, under a grey sky. As soon as I walked in the house, the lights flickered. And then suddenly there was a loud “Crack!” and “Crash!” and the sound of breaking glass. I looked out the window and trees were bent 90 degrees, then snapping, and then flying up instead of falling down.
As quickly as it came, it passed. When I stepped outside, my first thought was that my car has seen better days.
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Geoffrey Miller, Saxe Doernberger & Vita, P.C.Mr. Miller may be contacted at
gjm@sdvlaw.com
Recommendations and Drafting Considerations for Construction Contingency Clauses Part III
December 27, 2021 —
Samantha Schacht & Josh Levy - Construction ExecutiveThe best contracts provide the parties with a clear allocation of risks and responsibilities, and a process for handling inevitable project challenges. Contract negotiations can enable parties to have the difficult conversations allocating risks before the start of a project. An effective negotiation, in turn, aligns the parties’ expectations and helps avoid costly disputes born out of misunderstandings of the parties’ respective rights and responsibilities on the project.
This final installment of a three-part series on contingencies in construction contracts addresses factors that should be discussed and considered when drafting a contingency clause in a construction contract with the goal of helping to set clear expectations and avoid disputes.
Part I The Best Laid Plans: Contingency in a Construction Contract explained what a construction contingency is and
Part II The Best Laid Plans: Contingency in a Construction Contract discussed the two primary schools of thought on how a construction contingency fund should be used and managed.
Reprinted courtesy of
Samantha Schacht, Construction Executive and Josh Levy, Construction Executive, a publication of Associated Builders and Contractors. All rights reserved.
Ms. Schacht may be contacted at samantha.schacht@huschblackwell.com
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No Interlocutory Appeals of "Garden-Variety" Contract Disputes
March 12, 2015 —
Jesse Howard Witt – Acerbic WittColorado’s new procedure for interlocutory appeals has its limits. In the recent decision of Rich v. Ball Ranch Partnership, ___ P.3d ___, 2014 COA 6 (2015), the Colorado Court of Appeals held that Appellate Rule 4.2 does not permit interlocutory review of questions of law in “garden-variety” or “run-of-the-mill” contract disputes. This resolves a subtle question that has been lingering since Colorado first created the interlocutory appeal process four years ago.
Prior to 2011, Colorado did not permit civil litigants to seek appellate review prior to final judgment, except in a small handful of situations. As I discussed in an article at the time, this changed with the passage of C.R.S. § 13-4-102.1 and the adoption of Rule 4.2, which granted the court of appeals discretion to permit the immediate appeal of certain district court orders. These provisions allowed parties to seek interlocutory review of orders before the conclusion of a case if a district court could certify that (1) immediate review might promote a more orderly disposition or establish a final disposition of the litigation, and (2) the order involved a controlling and unresolved question of law. The rule was patterned after 28 U.S.C. § 1292(b), which provides similar relief in the federal courts.
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Jesse Howard Witt, The Witt Law FirmMr. Witt welcomes comments at www.acerbicwitt.com
Professor Stempel's Excpert Testimony for Insurer Excluded
October 07, 2019 —
Tred R. Eyerly - Insurance Law HawaiiThe court denied Daubert motions for several experts with the exception of Professor Stempel's expert testimony opining that the insurer did not act in bad faith Adell Plastics, Inc. v. Mt. Hawley Ins. Co., 2019 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 102942 (D. Md. June 19, 2019).
A fire demolished several buildings at Adell's facility. Adell was insured under a commercial property policy issued by Mt. Hawley. Mt. Hawley sued Adell, seeking a declaration that it owed no coverage, and requesting recoupment of a substantial advance payment. Adell filed a counterclaim, alleging that Mt. Hawley had breached the policy and had acted with a lack of good faith. Before the court were several pretrial motions, including motions to exclude testimony of eight expert witnesses.
The court denied Adell's motion to exclude several experts to be called by Mt. Hawley. The accountant's testimony was relevant. Adell had to prove damages on its breach of contract claim, and the accountant's testimony would aid the jury in evaluating Adell's documentation and calculating documented damages. Mt. Hawley's fire safety expert investigated the Adell fire. Mt. Hawley had shown that his expert opinion would be sufficiently reliable for admissibility. Further, three fire protection engineers offered by Mt. Hawley and two fire protection engineers to be called by Adell were allowed to testify. Each expert based his investigation and conclusions on the standards of fire investigation as set out in the NEPA Guide for Fire and Explosion Investigations. This was a fire insurance case, and fire protection engineers would be allowed to testify and illuminate the circumstances of the fire.
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Tred R. Eyerly, Damon Key Leong Kupchak HastertMr. Eyerly may be contacted at
te@hawaiilawyer.com
Client Alert: Restaurant Owed Duty of Care to Driver Killed by Third-Party on Street Adjacent to Restaurant Parking Lot
January 07, 2015 —
R. Bryan Martin, Lawrence S. Zucker II, & Kristian B. Moriarty – Haight, Brown, & Bonesteel, LLPIn Annocki v. Peterson Enterprise, LLC, (Filed 11/14/2014, Certified for Publication 12/5/2014, No. B251434) the Court of Appeal, Second District, held a restaurant owed a duty of care to the driver of a motorcycle who died as a result of the negligent driving of a third party exiting the restaurant’s parking lot.
Decedent, Joseph M. Annocki, was driving his motorcycle on Pacific Coast Highway in Malibu, when it collided with the vehicle operated by Terry Allen Turner, who was exiting the parking lot of “Geoffrey’s" restaurant, which was owned and operated by the Defendant, Peterson Enterprise, LLC (“Peterson”).
The parents of the decedent (“Plaintiffs”) filed suit against Peterson, alleging Peterson failed to adequately staff the restaurant parking lot, which caused Turner to become confused and make an illegal left turn onto Pacific Coast Highway, thereby causing the accident that killed decedent. Plaintiffs further alleged Peterson knew, or should have known, that its parking lot and driveway were designed and in such condition as to create a danger of decreased visibility of the adjacent highway, and failed to adequately provide signage directing patrons that only right turns could be made onto Pacific Coast Highway.
Reprinted courtesy of Haight Brown & Bonesteel LLP attorneys
R. Bryan Martin,
Lawrence S. Zucker II and
Kristian B. Moriarty
Mr. Martin may be contacted at bmartin@hbblaw.com
Mr. Zucker may be contacted at lzucker@hbblaw.com
Mr. Moriarty may be contacted at kmoriarty@hbblaw.com
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California’s High Speed Rail Project. Are We Done With the Drama?
October 22, 2014 —
Garret Murai – California Construction Law BlogProponents of California’s high-speed rail project cleared a major hurdle this past week when the California Supreme Court declined to review a California Court of Appeals ruling which held that the state’s funding plan did not violate Proposition 1A, the voter-approved initiative passed in 2008, which provided initial funding for the project.
For those like me who have been following the fits and starts of California’s high-speed rail project, it may be hard to remember how it all got started, and how we got to where we are.
California's High-Speed Rail Project
California’s high-speed rail project involves the construction of a high-speed passenger rail system running from Northern California to Southern California. The $68 billion system, expected to begin operation in 2029, will initially run from San Francisco to the Los Angeles basin in under 3 hours with train speeds capable of over 200 miles per hour. The system will eventually extend from Sacramento to San Diego covering a distance of approximately 800 miles with up to 24 stations.
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Garret Murai, Kronick Moskovitz Tiedemann & GirardMr. Murai may be contacted at
gmurai@kmtg.com
Safety Officials Investigating Death From Fall
September 09, 2011 —
CDJ STAFFCalifornia safety officials are looking into the circumstances surrounding the death of a construction worker who fell from a roof in Tiburon, California. Another worker found Gabriel Vasquez unconscious at the site. Vasquez was later pronounced dead. The State Division of Occupational Safety and Health are trying to determine how Vasquez fell.
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