Good Times, Tough Times

Concrete contractors in South Florida deal with cement shortage amidst record volume

By Scott Judy

The cement shortage has slowed down many South Florida projects and delayed the start of others, but three of the area's biggest concrete-forming contractors - Southland Forming of West Palm Beach, Fort Lauderdale-based Form Works and Commercial Forming Corp. of Pompano Beach - either have kept their projects on track, or are doing what they can to make up lost time.

Either way, the impact has been real.

On Form Works' 42-story Ocean Palms project in Hollywood, for example, the concrete contractor lost about three weeks on its schedule during a six-week period starting around mid-May.

"There were certain days we just couldn't get concrete," said Don Marks, the firm's president. That changed when concrete supplier Tarmac opened its new cement plant in June, he added.

"We're still seeing some impact," added Darrell Whiteside, president and CEO of Southland Forming. "I don't think we're going to see a lot of improvement in the current conditions for the next 12 months."

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At the same time, Thomas Prieur, vice president of Commercial Forming, said his firm had experienced "no problems," including on its highest-profile project, Trump Palace in Sunny Isles Beach.

"The projects we were on were not affected," he said. Prieur added that one time they had to switch concrete suppliers when the original one was unable to supply the project adequately. He said that overall, the shortage was "sort of leveling off."

Project Reports

Following are brief reports on these firms' biggest and brightest projects.

Ocean Palms - This luxury condominium in Hollywood transitions from a peak of 35 stories at one end to 42 stories at the other. Form Works has a roughly $20 million contract with Coastal Construction Services of Miami covering excavation, form work, reinforcing steel, concrete placement and finishing, as well as supplying the cranes and pumps.

The project was about halfway up in August, and the company was "seeing what we can do to catch up" on its three-week delay, Marks said.

Form Works started its concrete work for the foundations in late January and expects to complete its contract by March. The contractor is back on a floor-per-week schedule, with three pours of about 220 yds. each used to build the 24,000-sq.-ft. slabs.

Typical floors began on the fourth story. Form Works used 7,500-psi concrete for the slabs up to the 11th floor, and a 6,000-psi mix for the floors above that. There is an estimated 50,000 yds. of concrete on the job.

One Miami - Southland Forming's One Miami project in downtown Miami - which features two towers, one 43 stories and the other 44, plus an 11-story parking garage - felt virtually no impact from the cement shortage.

"(General contractor) John Moriarty & Associates really made it happen," said Tim Anderson, superintendent for Southland Forming. "The Related Group is the owner, and they're both known for completing their projects either early or on time. They decided where they needed their concrete the most, and we poured 1,100 to 1,200 yds. a week all through the shortage."

The company has completed the garage and in August was on the 23rd floor of the east tower and the 19th floor of the west tower. The towers are scheduled for completion in January and February, he added.

"It's a pretty hectic schedule," Anderson said. The contractor pours five slabs every six days. Each tower requires two pours per floor slab, so that's slightly more than one floor per week for both towers. In fact, with five slabs per week, that works out to five floors for each tower every month, Anderson said.

Tarmac and Super Mix tag-teamed to keep this high-profile project supplied with concrete and on schedule.

Despite the positive progress, Anderson is frustrated with One Miami's tight site conditions.

"There's no room for anything," he said, adding the company was using One Miami's parking garage as its staging area for its materials.

Trump Palace - One of Commercial Forming's biggest recent projects was this project for Donald Trump in Sunny Isles Beach. The company began its work in February 2003 and concluded its activity in August.

General contractor Coscan Construction LLC of Fort Lauderdale has the 551-ft.-tall, 43-story, ultraluxury condominium building scheduled for a June completion.

Commercial Forming's scope of work included formwork, layout, rebar placement and concrete pumping. Again, Prieur said the material shortage didn't impact the project's schedule at all, and the company was able to keep to its floor-per-week timetable.

"There was more vertical concrete than horizontal concrete, making it difficult to pour a floor each week," Prieur said.

Still Booming

Despite any dampening effect from the materials shortage, the South Florida construction economy appears as strong as ever, these contractors say, and it may be preparing to escalate even further.

"It's the fullest I've ever seen the pipeline," Marks said. "It's always possible that they'll have us bid jobs that will never get going. But right now we've never had this big of a backup on bidding."

Whiteside agreed. "The current level of activity is as high as we've seen it," he added. "There's still a lot of projects coming out of the pipeline. The backlog is greater than it's ever been."

Prieur with Commercial Forming described the current workload as similar to the past couple of years. "A lot of projects are going to start toward the end of this year, the beginning of next," he said. "We don't see a let-up."

This demand will continue to press the concrete suppliers.

"There's enormous demand," Marks said. "I don't know if all of the concrete plants can produce all of the concrete that we'll require if they all go at once."