In a ceremony held on October 28 at the University of Minnesota, AISC dedicated the 2022 edition of its Specification for Structural Steel Buildings (ANSI/AISC 360) to longtime volunteer and structural behavior research pioneer Theodore (Ted) V. Galambos. This dedication honors Galambos’ service on the AISC Committee on Specifications and several of its Task Committees since 1956. His pivotal research and publications on the load and resistance factor design (LRFD) method transformed the AISC Specification, which was most recently updated in 2016.

PartILLATION: Visions in Steel, a traveling art exhibition celebrating steel in the built environment, debuted Wednesday, October 12, at the Architecture Center Houston (ArCH). The exhibition curates photography and other work of visual artists from across the country to introduce visitors to steelworkers and their trade through portraiture, interviews, sound, and video.

Its name, PartILLATION, is a created word that borrows from the idea of it being a mix of art and installation. Owing to the latter, the centerpiece of PartILLATION is a tunnel that uses video-projected images and soundscapes to immerse visitors in a steel fabrication facility and to learn from the expertise of architects through a series of interview vignettes explaining the strong ties between design and steel.

AISC is proud to present the 2023 T.R. Higgins Lectureship Award to Jennifer McConnell, PhD, of the University of Delaware.

McConnell has conducted groundbreaking research into the performance of uncoated weathering steel (UWS) in bridges. Her work incorporates long-term field data on the performance of steel structures and corrosion protection methods in various environments and includes an analysis of practical design strategies that improve corrosion resistance.

SteelDay 2022 is in the books--and it was one for the books, too!

AISC members, the Ironworker Management Progressive Action Cooperative Trust, and others affiliated with the industry celebrated steel last week with events from Puerto Rico to Portland.

"Ray was a purposeful volunteer and leader in the technical activities of AISC, RCSC, and other organizations," said Charles J. Carter, SE, PE, PhD. "He always had things he wanted to accomplish and rarely did he fail. More personally, I remember how encouraging he was early in my career that I should pursue and achieve licensure as a PE and SE."

AISC’s ad hoc task group on Transbay has wrapped up its work and made its recommendations to the AISC Committee on Specifications. The group was formed after cracks were discovered in steel members in the newly opened Transbay Transit Center in San Francisco.

It’s expected the report will lead to a number of changes in future steel specifications. “The task group presented a holistic set of proposals dealing with fracture toughness, sharp discontinuities, stress levels, and inspection practices, while also considering practical commercial issues,” said AISC Vice President of Special Projects Lawrence F. Kruth, PE.

More than any other material, steel inspires big design ideas--so big that sometimes they exceed the scope of the Specification for Structural Steel Buildings.

Smart firms call on the research community when that happens. 

"Designers, fabricators, and researchers are all at the forefront of steel innovation," says Christopher Raebel, AISC's new vice president of engineering and research. "Great things can happen when they work together to solve problems and confirm that creative design solutions actually work--and, as a bonus, these projects can build connections between exceptional students and firms looking for a new generation of talented thinkers."

SteelDay, the annual celebration of the domestic fabricated structural steel industry, is fast approaching! SteelDay is October 21, but this year we just couldn't contain the festivities to one day. You'll find events throughout the week across the country.

"This year's SteelDay will be one for the books--that’s why our tagline is 'Can’t stop. Won’t stop'!" said American Institute of Steel Construction Vice President Carly Hurd. "It's our honor to represent this industry every day of the year, but SteelDay is a special day to recognize everyone who designs and builds with structural steel. We're thrilled to continue the program in 2022."

Merchants Bridge in St. Louis reopened to rail traffic last week, marking the completion of a decade-long, $222 million reconstruction of the vital rail artery connecting Missouri and Illinois.

As one of the most heavily traveled crossings over the Mississippi River, Merchants Bridge links the eastern and western rail networks in the United States, providing an alternative to more congested rail hubs like Chicago. The 133-year-old bridge required reconstruction due to speed, clearance, and load restrictions.

The American Institute of Steel Construction is pleased to announce that Sean Joyner will serve on the 2023 Forge Prize jury with Rona G. Rothenberg and Melanie Harris.

Joyner is a writer and essayist based in Los Angeles. He is currently the Southwest regional communications strategist at Gensler and previously served as an adjunct professor and director of communications at Woodbury University, where he received his Bachelor of Architecture degree.

Federal agencies will prioritize the purchase of key low-carbon construction materials, the White House announced Thursday, the latest action in its Federal Buy Clean initiative.

America's structural steel industry stands ready to support that mission, and it has already exceeded the Kyoto Protocol's emission reduction requirements by a factor of seven.

The American Institute of Steel Construction is pleased to announce that Melanie Harris, AIA, LSSYB, NCARB, will join Rona G. Rothenberg on the 2023 Forge Prize Jury.

An expert in healthcare architecture, Harris is currently the national healing practice director at BSA LifeStructures.

Alan "Ted" Sheppard has died at the age of 89.

"Ted was integral to connecting AISC with the erector community," said AISC Senior Vice President Scott Melnick. "He had friends everywhere and could always be counted on to make a needed introduction, offer practical advice, or join a group in a good glass of wine."

Registration is now open for AISC's Flash Steel Conference, which is designed to give busy professionals the technical and business information they need--fast.

The Flash Steel Conference, October 18 to 20, is a virtual event that features 20 insightful half-hour sessions whose impact far exceeds the time commitment. Participants can earn up to 10 PDHs.

The American Institute of Steel Construction is pleased to announce that Rona G. Rothenberg, FAIA, DBIA, will serve on the 2023 Forge Prize Jury.

She is currently serving as the president of AIA California and brings decades of expertise from more than 200 government, industry, health care, and higher education projects. In 2020, she received AIA's Thomas Jefferson Award for Public Architecture.

The American Iron and Steel Institute (AISI) Steel Bridge Task Force named metallurgical engineer Dean Krouse, a longtime member on AISC, AISI, and ASTM technical committees, as the first recipient of the new Alexander D. Wilson Memorial Award.

The award, which AISI will present annually, recognizes individuals who have made significant industry contributions to advance steel as the material of choice for bridges.

Fourteen student projects have won the American Institute of Steel Construction (AISC) and Association of Collegiate Schools of Architecture (ACSA) Steel Design Student Competition.

This year's competition offered an open category as well as a prompt that asked students to consider novel approaches to monuments and democratic public space in the 21st century.

The American Institute of Steel Construction’s Education Foundation is pleased to present Undergraduate Research Fellowships to two exceptionally promising students.

Aneesh Kakirde of Rutgers University and Haixin Zhou of Washington University in St. Louis will each receive $2,500 to conduct research projects during the fall 2022 academic term.

"These fellowships prepare today's promising students to become tomorrow's thought leaders," said AISC Director of Research Devin Huber, PE, PhD. "Domestic structural steel is already the most sustainable, resilient, cost-effective, fast, reliable, and adaptable material on the market, and great ideas from promising young researchers like Aneesh and Haixin will continue to keep steel on the cutting-edge."

AISC is proud to welcome Christopher H. Raebel, SE, PE, PhD, as its new vice president of engineering and research. He succeeds Larry Kruth, PE, who is retiring later this year.

Raebel will oversee all AISC technical activities, including the development of AISC's standards and technical publications, research programs, and technical assistance through the AISC Steel Solutions Center.

What will the future look like? Let's explore the possibilities with structural steel--from the imaginations of the emerging architects who will build tomorrow's real world!

AISC is now accepting entries for its fifth annual Forge Prize competition.

The Forge Prize, established by the American Institute of Steel Construction in 2018, recognizes visionary emerging architects for design concepts that embrace steel as a primary structural component and capitalize on steel's ability to increase a project's speed.

AISC is now accepting nominations for its 2023 award programs that honor remarkable people.

Each year, AISC presents Lifetime and Special Achievement Awards to exceptional industry professionals, designers, and educators. The 2023 winners will receive special recognition at NASCC: The Steel Conference in Charlotte, N.C., April 12-14, 2023.

"The design community and domestic fabricated steel construction industry today are all about innovation," said AISC President Charles J. Carter, SE, PE, PhD, “and that's driven by the extraordinary leaders who make a difference shaping the built environment of today and tomorrow. AISC is honored to highlight the people who make our industry, design, and structural steel so special."

The American Society of Civil Engineers - Toledo Section celebrated its 100th anniversary by recognizing the Anthony Wayne Bridge in Toledo, Ohio, as a civil engineering landmark. 

The bridge was a landmark from the very beginning, designed by Waddell & Hardesty and constructed by the McClintic-Marshall Company. It was also a trendsetter: It’s the first American bridge to use deep, riveted plate girder spans. The 3,218-ft-long suspension bridge replaced a series of drawbridges across the Maumee River, providing unfettered access between the east and west sides of the river so commerce could flourish throughout northwest Ohio. 

Around the country, recent university graduates are starting their first jobs as practicing engineers. It's exciting--but also eye-opening. They're learning just how much they don't know.

The American Institute of Steel Construction's Night School will give them a jump-start as they start their careers--or provide a thorough refresher for experienced engineers who want to go back to basics.

"University professors do an incredible job giving fledgling engineers a solid grounding in how steel behaves and introducing the AISC Specification and Manual that they'll use for the rest of their careers," said AISC Senior Director of Education Christina Harber. "But there's only so much you can squeeze into a syllabus. We want to give them a head start as they begin to practice."

New Hampshire Governor Chris Sununu has signed Buy America legislation into law during a visit to AISC-member Capone Iron Corporation North Woods, Inc.'s fabrication facility in Berlin, N.H. The new regulations require the use of American contractors and products on state-funded construction projects.

"These findings are frankly not at all surprising," said National Steel Bridge Alliance (NSBA) Senior Director of Market Development Jeff Carlson, PE. "This direct comparison of two functionally equivalent bridges confirms what we've known for years: that steel is the most sustainable and economical structural material out there--both when a bridge is built and for the duration of its service life."

The American Institute of Steel Construction is seeking nominations for the prestigious T.R. Higgins Lectureship Award, which recognizes an innovative lecturer/author whose outstanding technical writing constitutes a ground-breaking addition to engineering literature on fabricated structural steel.

In addition to taking home a $15,000 cash prize, the T.R. Higgins Lectureship Award winner will present a keynote address at the 2023 NASCC: The Steel Conference in Charlotte, N.C., April 12 to 14. The winner will also present his/her work, upon request, at various prestigious professional events throughout the year.

In 1953, Gatti was asked to estimate a detailing price for a bid to reconstruct the Third Avenue swing span over the Harlem River in New York City. "Being 20 years old and capable of doing anything, including scaling tall buildings, I responded with, 'Of course,'" he recalled in a 2006 essay in Modern Steel Construction. After it won the bid, that company asked him to start a bridge detailing department--a field that was, by Gatti's own admission, absolutely foreign to him at the time. 

"When you are thrown in the middle of a lake, you learn to swim quickly or drown," he said. "I avoided drowning by hiring some capable steel detailers and learning from them as fast as I could."

"W&W | AFCO Steel is proud to announce this expansion in Little Rock. Our bridge operations are headquartered in Little Rock and we are happy to seize the opportunity to make a productive plant out of this vacant building," Grady Harvell, president and COO of W&W | AFCO Steel, said in an announcement from the Arkansas Economic Development Commission. "The new facility will enhance our ability to continue providing competitive steel bridges to the state of Arkansas and the region as well as increase our production capacity for steel building products."

AISC Seismic Provisions for Structural Steel Buildings (AISC 341) apply to the design, fabrication, and erection of structural steel and composite steel and concrete seismic force-resisting systems. Table D1.1a is available for public comment from May 13 to June 12, 2022.

AISC Seismic Provisions for Structural Steel Buildings (AISC 341) apply to the design, fabrication, and erection of structural steel and composite steel and concrete seismic force-resisting systems. Table D1.1b is available for public comment from April 1 to May 1, 2022.

AISC Seismic Provisions for Evaluation and Retrofit of Existing Structural Steel Buildings (AISC 342) are intended to be used with ASCE/SEI 41 for the seismic evaluation and retrofit of existing structural steel buildings. Table C4.2 is available for public comment from April 1 to May 16, 2022.

A vision of a reinvigorated public housing community in Harlem has won the American Institute of Steel Construction's 2022 Forge Prize. 

Vincent Yee Foo Lai of Adjaye Associates and Douglas Lee of the University of California, Berkeley took home the $10,000 grand prize for an inspiring concept to transform public housing in New York City's Harlem.

Judges praised the design for its creative approach to the demand for low-cost housing, deliberately fostering communities within communities, and using modular options to introduce an element of agency that is missing from most current affordable housing schemes.

The "Common-Sky" vision would essentially create a new steel housing block atop the Riverton Square development in Harlem, with a focus on building community not just among neighbors but between occupants of the new and old sections.

"To rebuild is very easy--just take down the existing building," said Lai. "Why don't we think of ways to leverage the existing community and build a new one?"

"It's fitting that the inaugural Bridge of the Year Award goes to a first-of-its-kind project," said NSBA Senior Director of Market Development Jeff Carlson. "The I-91 Interchange 29 Exit Ramp Flyover Bridge marks the beginning of a new approach to eliminating fracture critical elements by providing load path redundancy--one that has already made an impact beyond Connecticut’s borders."

A Seattle high-rise using a first-of-its-kind core system. A staircase that looks like a floating ribbon. A performance venue named for a rock-and-roll pioneer. A museum designed to look like an athlete in motion.

What do they all have in common?

They're all steel-framed. And they’re all 2022 AISC IDEAS² Award winners.

"Bob was the capable and respected face of AISC and our industry for a generation of engineers," recalled Charles J. Carter, AISC’s president. "He led our annual seminar series, connecting tens of thousands of designers to AISC and engaging many hundreds of speakers from the design community, industry, and academia in the process for more than a decade. His character, kindness, and caring were obvious to all." 

"WIC Week gives chapters nationwide the opportunity to shine a bright light on the construction industry and women's very important place in it," said NAWIC Executive Director Crissy Ingram. "There has long been a culture of construction being only for men. If we can get the women who have worked past that barrier out of the shadows and into the spotlight, they can show other women–no matter the age or background–that there are countless opportunities for them in the industry."

Ronald “Ronnie” Glenn Sherrill, 72, an AISC Board of Directors member from 2005 to 2018, died peacefully at his home, surrounded by his family, on October 3, 2021.

The AISC Steel Sculpture was once a one-of-a-kind teaching tool for engineering students. Now, after 35 years of service and scenery, the AISC Steel Sculpture has siblings all over North and South America. Delve into its inception and heritage.

A recent dive into the AISC archives uncovered a treasure trove: Kodachrome slides (remember those?) from the construction of the Gateway Arch. Dim the lights and join us for a nostalgic glimpse back at the making of an American icon.

Structural steel is already the gold standard for rapid erection. But what if we could make it even faster?

AISC is offering $5,000 for up to three great ideas to revolutionize steel floor beam connections. Your back-of-the-napkin, so-crazy-it-just-might-work concept could become the next revolutionary, non-proprietary connection system!

Running from October 26 to 28, this virtual event takes the compelling, must-have info you expect from AISC’s conferences and packages it into an efficient set of 20, half-hour-long flash sessions that fit perfectly into your busy life.

The 2022 edition, which AISC expects to release next summer, will include a new chapter that compiles fabrication and erection tolerances, revised criteria for AESS members, and new requirements for contract documents that cannot be omitted as specific instructions to the contrary. It also has expanded guidance on erector means and methods and access holes, preferred material specification, and updated tolerance figures.

AISC has awarded William N. Collins, PE, PhD, associate professor at the University of Kansas School of Engineering, the 2021 Milek Fellowship. His research project--the first bridge-focused project funded with a Milek Fellowship--will explore innovative steel deck systems for highway bridge applications, which could reduce bridges' weight and ensure faster erection times.

George Wendt, former president of AISC member bender-roller Chicago Metal Rolled Products and member of AISC’s Bender-Roller Committee, passed away on September 11. He was 73.

Laurence “Larry” LeJeune, former AISC Board Member and owner of LeJeune Steel Company, died on August 12 at the age of 85.

In 1967, he and his brother, Tom, purchased LeJeune Steel from their father and developed it into the preeminent steel fabricator in the Twin Cities. The company has been a longtime major contributor to AISC, assisting with research projects and devoting substantial staff time to raise the profile of fabricated structural steel, and Larry served as an AISC Board Member from 1981 to 1989.

As the nation solemnly marks the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, we'd like to take a moment to thank a very special group of people who answered the call and offered their expertise in a time of great need: structural engineers. As first responders combed through the debris at ground zero, engineers kept them safe by ensuring that the partially collapsed structure was sound as excavations progressed in precarious conditions.