There is life after the Pinnacle Bank Arena in Lincoln’s construction industry.
A year ago almost 4,000 construction workers were at work building the arena and the new street system through what had been an old railyard.
Reports indicate about 60 percent of those workers were from Lincoln, and another 32 percent from elsewhere in the state.
But there has been no drop in construction in the Lincoln area this winter -- several months after the arena was completed -- based on Labor Department data and on feedback from construction company executives.
The data show employment in Nebraska construction is flat this winter. Statewide numbers were the same in December 2012 as December 2013, said Ken Simonson, chief economist for Associated General Contractors of America.
Nationally there was a 2 percent gain in construction during the same time period, he said.
People are also reading…
Construction jobs in the Lincoln area continued to grow this fall -- after the arena was completed -- improving by 3 percent, Labor Department data show.
Unemployment statistics also indicate no slump in construction locally, according to Jean Petsch, executive director of the Associated General Contractors Nebraska Building Chapter.
Since there has been no spike in unemployment, Petsch said it appears that those who worked on arena-related construction have been absorbed in other local projects.
Local builders say the work still going is an indication that the construction market in Lincoln remains healthy. Those projects include the Olsson Associates building, Hobson Place condos and parking garages in the West Haymarket; a new Catholic church next to the University of Nebraska-Lincoln campus; a 10-story building for student housing and parking at 18th and Q; work on Nebraska Innovation Campus and growing numbers of housing starts.
Many of the construction companies that helped build the arena have moved on to other jobs.
Hampton Construction, which partnered with Minnesota-based Mortenson Construction on the arena, has picked up other work.
The company just finished projects for the Aurora Cooperative, Whole Foods and the Lincoln Public Schools District Office along O Street. Hampton is currently building a new Russ’s grocery in Hastings and a health center in Lexington and is preparing for construction of a school in Holdrege, said Lincoln Zehr, the company's CEO.
While he wouldn’t call local construction robust, Doug Klute, Hampton's business development manager, said there is still a considerable amount of work going on.
Concrete Industries, a NEBCO company, was a major supplier of concrete material for the arena and related development in the West Haymarket.
This winter the company has been working on the three parking garages that either opened recently or are going up near the arena and is doing “quite a bit of smaller commercial work,” said Robert Nordquist, NEBCO Inc. president.
“It’s been pretty busy,” Nordquist said. “I’m not sure that will last through all of 2014, but at least the first half is pretty good.”
Stephens & Smith Construction, a local company that polished the concrete floors throughout the arena, has experienced growth of about 15 percent in the Lincoln area during the past year and 25 percent overall. "And our backlog would indicate this is going to continue, said Steve Willis, chief executive officer.
Much of the growth is simply the market recovering to pre-recession numbers, Willis said, and the downtown projects "have obviously helped concrete subcontractors like ourselves."
Some of the major players, the public faces on the arena project, have also moved on to new jobs.
* John Hinshaw, Mortenson's construction manager, took a senior executive job with a construction company in Louisville, Ky.
* Paula Yancey Portz, project manager for the arena, is still coming to Lincoln to monitor work on the two additional parking garages now going up. Her company, PC Sports, is also overseeing work on the Municipal Services Center, the old Experian building being converted for city use.
* Bob Caldwell, who was president of Hampton Construction during arena work, is now president and chief operating officer of the real estate division of WRK LLC, a Lincoln-based developer involved in West Haymarket projects.
* Dan Marvin, who coordinated arena-related work for the city, was recently named the executive director of the Nebraska Democratic Party.
