Industry News

The Florida School for the Deaf and Blind has selected the Stellar Group to design, build, and provide construction management for the expansion and renovation of Gibbs Hall in St. Augustine, Fla. The $4.8-million project includes the construction of a covered walkway. The renovated 28,000-sf facility will accommodate career-specific training for blind students, classrooms, and teacher offices. Construction will commence on May 28, 2005, with project completion slated for November of the same year.

Camden County College is planning an $83 million project to rebuild more than fifty percent of its Blackwood, N.J., campus over the next six years. The Madison Hall Connector Building will be the first facility to be constructed, which will house the college's Center for Civic Leadership and Responsibility. Other new construction projects include a science facility, a student services building, an interactive classroom and atrium for public forums, and upgraded athletic fields.

RETS Tech Center, a private technical school, is planning a 13,000-sf expansion to accommodate a registered nurse training program. The $1.7 million project will allow enrollment to increase thirty percent for a projected total of 700 students. Alleviating crowding in the school's existing 43,500-sf of classroom and laboratory facilities, the facility is expected to be ready for occupancy in September 2005. Between 75 and 100 registered nurses will graduate from the program annually.

Miles College, a historically black college founded in 1905, has completed three projects totaling $17 million on its Fairfield, Ala., campus: a 55,000-sf, 250-bed dormitory for men; a 45,000-sf classroom, seminar, and auditorium facility; and the renovated Brown Hall, which houses executive suites and conference rooms featuring state-of-the-art technology. The projects were designed by Exford LLC of Birmingham and built by Doster Construction Co.

Honda Motor Co . broke ground on May 11, 2005 on a 250,000-sf manufacturing facility in Tallapoosa, Ga. The $100-million plant will produce 300,000 automatic transmissions annnually beginning in fall 2006 and will employ 400 workers.