The Chicago Concrete Breaking Company, as Graycor was known more than 100 years ago, performed its first project removing existing concrete retaining walls which abutted operational railroad tracks in the City of Chicago.

That project, and early projects of similar nature, not only taught Graycor how to work in a live environment, but also gave rise to our famed motto:

“Wanted – A Hard Job.”

The live environment process is applicable to projects across all markets. We continuously strive to better understand our clients’ businesses so we can tailor our work plan around their needs.

When renovating operations facilities with live environments, the challenges encountered are distinctly different than the challenges faced on greenfield construction projects. Contract drawings provide the technical details for construction, however, the details of existing conditions, phasing, logistics, sequencing, and “temporary construction” scope require our expertise to develop.

Over the years, our team developed our Live Environment Checklist— tool that captures hundreds of years of combined experience from our employees who have successfully delivered construction projects within various operational environments. By sharing lessons learned from these complex projects and capturing best practices, we enable future project teams to learn from the challenges of past projects, thereby improving performance and preventing repeat mistakes. The goal is for each project team to draw upon the Company’s collective wealth of experience to deliver consistently successful projects to our clients.