The 1980s and 1990s
By the time Kiewit celebrated its centennial in 1984, the company had district offices throughout the United States and Canada, and was performing nearly all types of construction work. In the risk-filled construction business, few companies make it to the centennial mark, so this was a meaningful milestone.
Throughout the 1980s and 1990s, Kiewit continued to grow and prosper, developing contracting opportunities in the public sector and expanding into significant markets in the private sector.
Notable projects in this period included rebuilding downtown Atlanta’s I-75/85/20 Interchange; rehabilitating the Francis Scott Key Bridge over the Potomac River in Washington, D.C.; fabricating Bullwinkle, the world’s largest freestanding oil production platform in the Gulf of Mexico; and constructing portions of the $5.3 billion Hibernia oil platform in the waters off St. John’s, Newfoundland.
As a result of the company’s success in its construction and mining operations, Walter Scott, Jr. looked for related businesses in which to invest the company’s excess capital throughout the 1980s and early 1990s. This led, in 1992, to the separation of the construction and diversified businesses. The diversified investments, in everything from high-speed fiber optic networks to public/private toll roads to geothermal power plants, garnered superior returns, prompted Barron’s magazine to pronounce Scott “one of the shrewdest investors around.”
When the businesses were separated in 1992, Kiewit’s Construction Group retained the Peter Kiewit Sons’, Inc. name and Ken Stinson was elected President. In 1993, Ken was named Chairman and CEO, succeeding Walter Scott, Jr., who became Chairman Emeritus of the Kiewit board.
Kiewit became a leader in the use of the design-build delivery method during this period. By starting construction before design is complete, and by ensuring construction issues are considered early in the process by the design team, design-build has helped our clients complete some of the largest and most complicated projects in the country, ahead of schedule and below budget. Examples include the $33 million 7–mi. entrance to Yosemite National Park; the $60 million multi-modal Whittier Access Tunnel in Whittier, Alaska; the $802 million San Joaquin Hills Transportation Corridor in Orange County, California; and the $1.3 billion I-15 Reconstruction project in Salt Lake City, Utah.