Cranes signal strong construction industry

A 20 per cent growth in the number of cranes across Australia’s capital cities over the past six months reflects a strong construction industry, finds the latest RLB Crane Index.

The biannual RLB Crane Index, published by Rider Levett Bucknall, tracks the numbers of cranes in Australia’s capital cities and provides a simplified measure of the current state of the construction industry’s workload.

RLB’s eighth edition finds a 145 per cent increase in crane activity since the fourth quarter of 2013, when the Index was first published.

Nationally, 647 cranes are working on construction sites, with 288 in Sydney, 148 in Melbourne and 104 in Brisbane. All Australian cities have recorded increased or neutral crane activity since the last survey.

“The increase of an additional 113 cranes since our last count was mainly centred in Sydney with 76, Gold Coast 14, Melbourne 12 and Canberra 11. Perth was the only city to show a fall in crane activity, albeit by a small number,” the report finds.

A 20 per cent national increase in crane activity includes an 80 per cent churn rate – in other words, 80 per cent of all cranes counted in the previous Crane Index were removed and erected on other sites around Australia.

“This churn rate highlights very strong levels of activity over the short term,” RLB says.

This rise in crane numbers is due to the increase in multi-storey residential development, RLB says, and accounts for 81 per cent of all cranes recorded – or a whopping 525 cranes.

 

Download the RLB Crane Index for Q2 2016.