Eco-Friendly, Terrorist-Safe, But Not Cheap

There's a price to be paid for designing and constructing federal buildings in major urban areas in an era when concerns about both terrorism and the state of the environment are running high. San Francisco Chronicle columnists Phillip Matier and Andrew Ross report that an 18-story state of the art federal building in the city is a year and a half late and millions of dollars over budget. One problem was that "ecologically sensitive fly ash" was mixed into the cement used in construction, causing it to take much looner than expected to cure. Another was that tons of steel and concrete were added to help the building withstand a bomb blast.