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Measure It

The Joliet Junior College AEC Construction Survey team has been getting some hands-on work using different measuring devices. Sounds like a pretty boring assignment, right? Really, who doesn’t know how to measure something…? Using a […]

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Digital Hygiene

I’m grabbing this Short from Ryder because it’s worth exploring-The concept of data hoarding. What am I doing with all of the source data I’ve collected? How many PDFs do I really need? A library […]

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A Cool Podcast Shout-Out

It’s always neat to see how people with common interests find collection points through the Internet. I received an email from Dany over at LED Lighting Supply letting me know that they curated a list […]

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Small Engine Repairs Are Fun!!

Fixing things yourself is becoming lost craft. It seems like, more and more, society is becoming apt to dispose and replace, as opposed to repair and maintain. I, for one, will ALWAYS try to tackle […]

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On Being an Instructor

Note: I originally wrote this on June 5, 2022 – It’s worth sharing now…. Having just hit “Submit” on the semester final grades, I thought it would be a good time to open the laptop […]

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Chicago Veterans Ruck March 2024

On May 24, 2024, I had the chance to participate in the Chicago Veterans 10th Annual Ruck March. The 17-mile ruck was chartered to raise awareness to veteran suicide: It is estimated that 17 former […]

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Sunday….

I know that I should have been honoring the Lord’s Day by resting today, but I had a lot of chores to complete as we have some work being done around our house tomorrow. Not […]

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New Drone Bill Legislation in Illinois

Interesting development in the Illinois Senate as a proposed bill is making its way through the review process. Senate Bill SB2849 proposes to allow Illinois municipalities to write local legislation to “…adopt reasonable rules…” related […]

Honoring Firefighters

FROM THE ARCHIVES

  • ARCHIVES

    Asking the Simple Question – The Solution

    In my previous article (CLICK HERE to read it), I described the maturation of a piling bearing capacity issue that we had on a recent railroad bridge project. Let’s dive into getting the issues resolved. [...]
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    Asking the Simple Questions – The Problem

    “Ego clouds and disrupts everything: the planning process, the ability to take good advice, and the ability to accept constructive criticism. It can even stifle someone’s sense of self-preservation. Often, the most difficult ego to [...]
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    When Slopes Fail – Part 2

    In this, Part 2 of my series on slope stability & erosion control failures, I want to dissect another jobsite failure that one of our projects suffered through a couple of years ago. The conditions, [...]
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    When Slopes Fail – Part 1

    There are some people I know, when talking about their “college days,” who can recite chapters & verses of classes they took. They can remember class numbers, people in the class, problems they solved, the [...]
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    It’s More than a Line

    I wanted to write a post discussing a design issue that we encountered out here on our site. MicroStation, AutoCADD and the like are the daily tools of choice for almost all designers, and no [...]
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    The Risk of Traffic – Final Chapter

    So as I’ve developed in the last 2 posts, traffic control on a construction project exposes just about everyone involved in the process to RISK. A motorcycle accident in 2008 sent me through the legal [...]
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    The Risk of Traffic – Part 2

    As I developed in my last post, engineers in construction are often-times thrust into situations of RISK that, in many instances, are completely beyond their direct control. I’m going to take you on a tour [...]

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