The battered U.S. construction industry has been shedding jobs with little reprieve since the recession, so a new report on which building projects yield the most construction jobs is food for thought on how economic stimulus dollars might be used more efficiently in the future. Smart Growth America, a community-building advocacy organization, analyzed state data on the infrastructure projects funded by the federal stimulus, and concludes in its new “Lessons from the Stimulus” report that transit and road maintenance projects trump new road construction in terms of producing jobs (see the full report after the jump). For every stimulus dollar spent on transportation, there were 70 percent more hours of employment produced than a dollar spent on building a new road, the report says. But as it turns out, states spent relatively little — $462.8 million, nationwide — on transportation, compared to the $8.9 billion they spent on new roads. TRD [more]

David Walentas

Dumbo development kingpins David and Jed Walentas are on track to restart their stalled, 73-room hotel project in Williamsburg if the city approves the designation of $15 million in federal stimulus funding towards the “shovel-ready” project today, according to the Brooklyn Paper. The boutique hotel, on Wythe Avenue and North 11th Street, would be borne of a renovation of a five-story former textile factory. In 2008, the city rejected the Walentases’ $3.6 million plan for the building, which would have doubled its height. But today, their Two Trees Management is among three developers awaiting a decision from the city about who will receive funding, and how much. It wouldn’t be the only new luxury hotel in the transforming Northside area of Williamsburg, once filled with factories and row houses, as another is slated to open next year. Two Trees says the project will create 75 construction jobs and 195 permanent jobs, though the city pegs the estimate as significantly lower. [Brooklyn Paper]

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The city’s real estate industry is lobbying for federal stimulus money for the cash-strapped No. 7 subway extension, calling it a shovel-ready project that will improve the quality of life for future residents of Hudson Yards. The planned extension is currently slated to create just one new subway station at West 34th Street and 11th Avenue by 2013, allowing the train to zip by another proposed stop at West 41st Street and 10th Avenue, the Post’s Lois Weiss reported. It would cost an estimated $500 million to create the 41st Street stop — right above a planned Related Companies apartment tower — and another $300 million to make sure the station is up to snuff in terms of safety. Since funding isn’t available, the feds “could bid it right out” as a stimulus project, said Mary Anne Tighe, chair of the Real Estate Board of New York. Ann Weisbrod, president of the Hudson Yards Development Corp., said that if the Metropolitan Transportation Authority delays construction of a 41st Street station until after Related builds its tower, it will ultimately cost significantly more. [Post]

East Harlem construction workers at the nation’s first housing development to be built with federal stimulus money have been severely underpaid, workers have alleged. The U.S. Labor Department and the city department of Housing Preservation and Development are investigating claims that workers at Hobbs Court on East 102nd and 103rd streets, and at the Ciena on East 100th Street — slated to open in 2011 with 340 affordable apartment units in total — were scammed out of their rightful wages. A worker on the interior demolition at Hobbs Court said he was paid $32 per hour for a job that is lawfully required to pay $49 per hour, and on top of that, the work site was unsafe, with no fall protection or place to attach safety harnesses. The two developments received $26 million from the stimulus act’s Tax Credit Assistant Program, and the city chose Phipps Houses and Urban Builders Collaborative as the developers through competitive bidding. Lettire Construction Corp. is the general contractor. [NYDN]

Four New York City affordable housing projects will be among the first
to begin construction after receiving federal stimulus funding. About
$60 million of the $85 million the city has received for affordable
housing from the stimulus package will go toward the construction of
739 units at three developments in East Harlem and one in East New
York, Brooklyn. Construction is set to begin immediately, Mayor Michael
Bloomberg and Governor David Paterson said. The projects are expected
to create about 2,800 jobs, most in construction work. The units will
be available to households with incomes of up to $46,080. [more]

The Metropolitan Transportation Authority said that it would complete construction of the long-delayed
Fulton Street Transit Center in 2014, seven years behind the project’s
originally scheduled date. The MTA plans to spend $424 million in federal
stimulus money to plug a hole in the project’s budget, and when it’s
finished, the project will cost about $1.4 billion, nearly twice the
original estimate. Michael Horodniceanu, president of capital
construction for the MTA, vowed to stick to the
new budget and schedule. Parts
of the center will open before the building is done, and most of the
improvements to the subway, including easier connections between lines,
will be finished by 2012, Horodniceanu said.