The third quarter of 2025 reveals a mixed landscape in construction activity, with crane counts showing modest shifts across the 17 cities surveyed by Rider Levett Bucknall (RLB). While economic uncertainty influences development decisions, the overall market remains cautiously active.
Of the cities surveyed, seven experienced a decline in crane activity, six held steady, and four saw an increase.
This distribution suggests a hesitancy in large-scale construction, though signs of growth persist in select markets such as education, federal, and transportation. The balance between declining and rising crane counts points to a transitional phase, where developers are weighing opportunities against ongoing financial pressures.
A few key insights:
- Crane counts have increased in Calgary, Chicago, Denver, and San Francisco.
- Austin, Honolulu, Las Vegas, Seattle, Toronto, and Washington, DC are holding steady in their crane counts.
- Cities with a decrease of more than 20 percent include Boston, Los Angeles, Miami, Nashville, New York City, Phoenix and Portland.
Denver
Denver’s cranes increased by five this quarter, largely for mixed-use residential with ground-floor retail. Two new Class A office projects, both pre-leased, add stability. The market is transitioning from its residential boom of 2022–2023 toward a more diversified pipeline, with several large master-planned communities on the horizon.
Rider Levett Bucknall’s Crane Index® for North America is published biannually. It tracks the number of operating tower cranes in 17 major cities across the U.S. and Canada. The index was the first of its kind, and unlike other industry barometers that track cost and other financial data, the Crane Index® tracks the number of fixed cranes on construction sites and gives a simplified measure of the current state of the construction industry’s workload in each location.
Download the report here.
