Hartford Business Journal

16 HARTFORDBUSINESS.COM | JUNE 15, 2026 Building Back After Great Recession and pandemic setbacks, CT construction employment reaches highest level since 2008 years to design, permit and fund, Eucalitto said. As a result, many of today's projects can be traced back to investments made a decade ago. In 2015, state lawmakers and Gov. Dannel Malloy approved the $2.8 billion "Let's Go CT" transpor- tation bonding package, a long-term initiative aimed at modernizing the state's infrastructure. The funding supported planning and design work for projects that later became eligible for federal dollars under the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act of 2021. State lawmakers also increased Connecticut's transportation borrowing cap, allowing the state to secure matching funds needed to maxi- mize federal aid, Eucalitto said. Those investments helped advance major transportation projects, including the seven-year, $712 million reconstruction of the interchange connecting interstates 91 and 691 with Route 15 in Meriden. Donald Shubert, presi- dent of the Connecticut Construction Industries Association, credited the sector's growth to a combination of federal infrastructure By Michael Puffer mpuffer@hartfordbusiness.com N early two decades after the Great Recession devastated Connecticut's construction industry, employment in the sector has climbed to its highest level since before the housing market collapse. Connecticut's construction work- force reached 65,200 workers in April, its highest level since 2008, according to seasonally adjusted state labor data. Industry leaders credit the milestone to years of workforce development efforts, infrastructure investment and a growing pipeline of public- and private-sector projects. "The volume of really nice projects — large, complex healthcare, higher ed, K-12, housing and whatnot — is far beyond what I've seen in my 20 years in this market," said Eric Cushman, a vice president leading Gilbane Building Co.'s Connecticut operations. "The demand is coming across all market sectors at a collectively impressive scale." The national construc- tion and real estate development firm's Connecticut revenue has grown by nearly 70% since 2021, Cushman said. As a result, Gilbane has expanded its Connecticut work- force by about 10% over the past year, to 130 employees, and continues to hire project managers, engineers and superintendents. Much of the hiring is aimed at meeting future demand. While Gilbane's workload in Connecticut has remained consistently strong in 2025 and 2026, Cushman said the company expects even more activity over the next three years based on current inquiries and requests. He said the growing pipeline includes projects across a range of sectors, from publicly funded infrastructure and institutional work to private development, reflecting what he sees as continued economic growth in Connecticut. This April's construction employ- ment number was the highest since April 2008, when the industry employed 67,600 people, according to the Connecticut Department of Labor. Employment plunged during the Great Recession, falling to 50,500 in April 2010 as the collapse of housing and mortgage markets rippled through the economy. Construction employment grad- ually recovered over the following decade, climbing back above 60,000 by 2019. The COVID-19 pandemic briefly reversed that progress, pushing employment down to 49,400 in April 2020, before the industry resumed a steady recovery. Infrastructure spending bears fruit State Department of Transportation Commissioner Garrett Eucalitto said employment in highway, street and bridge construction is at its highest level in more than a decade. In July 2025, there were 7,700 people employed in highway construction, a 15-year high, Eucalitto said. Federal and state transportation spending in Connecticut has trended upward over the past dozen years, doubling from $1.3 billion in fiscal 2014 to a planned $2.69 billion in the current fiscal year. Transportation projects take many Eric Cushman Garrett Eucalitto Donald Shubert Bill Jodice, owner of PDS Engineering & Construction, at a Manchester site where his firm is building a 68,000-square-foot expansion for Allied Printing. HBJ Photo | Michael Puffer

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