Construction Trades Occupations

Highway maintenance workers

Maintain highways, municipal and rural roads, airport runways, and rights-of-way in safe condition by patching broken or eroded pavement or erecting and repairing guard rails, highway markers, and snow fences. May also clear brush or plant trees along rights-of-way.

1996 employment: 171,000
Projected 1996-2006 employment change: A decline
Most significant source of training: Up to 1 month of on-the-job training

Mining, quarrying, and tunneling occupations

Rock splitters, quarry: Separate blocks of rough dimension stone from quarry mass using jackhammer, wedges, and feathers. Roof bolters: Operate self-propelled machine to install roof support bolts in underground mines. Mining machine operators: Operate mining machines, such as self-propelled or truck-mounted drilling machines, continuous mining machines, channeling machines, and cutting machines to extract coal, metal and nonmetal ores, rock, stone, or sand from underground or surface excavation. Continuous mining machine operators: Operate self-propelled mining machine that rips coal from the face and loads it onto conveyors or into shuttle cars in a continuous operation. Mine cutting and channeling machine operators: Cut or channel along the face or seams of coal, quarry stone, or other mining surfaces to facilitate blasting, separating, or removing minerals or materials from mines or from the earth's surface.

1996 employment: 16,000
Projected 1996-2006 employment change: A decline
Most significant source of training: More than 12 months of on-the-job training

Paving, surfacing, and tamping equipment operators

Operate equipment used for applying concrete, asphalt, or other materials to roadbeds, parking lots, or airport runways and taxiways; or equipment used for tamping gravel, dirt, or other materials.

1996 employment: 79,000
Projected 1996-2006 employment change: Faster than average Most significant source of training: 1 to 12 months of on-the-job training

Pipelayers and pipelaying fitters

Pipelayers: Lay glazed or unglazed clay, concrete, plastic, or cast-iron pipe for storm or sanitation sewers, drains, water mains, and oil or gas lines. May grade trenches or culverts, position pipe, or seal joints. Pipelaying fitters: Align pipeline section preparatory to welding. Signal tractor driver in placing pipeline sections in proper alignment and insert steel spacers.

1996 employment: 62,000
Projected 1996-2006 employment change: Slower than average
Most significant source of training: 1 to 12 months of on-the-job training

Roustabouts

Assemble or repair oil field equipment using hand and power tools. Perform other tasks as needed.

1996 employment: 28,000
Projected 1996-2006 employment change: A decline
Most significant source of training: Up to 1 month of on-the-job training

Production Occupations

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