C. Howard Nye - Martin Marietta Materials, Inc.
Management
Good afternoon, Kathryn. Thanks for your question. I think part of what you just said answers the first part of it. So, if we come back and say, looking at state lettings and contract awards in Florida, they're up 21%. In North Carolina, they're up 65%. In Texas, they're up 33%. So when we're looking at that type of activity in the public area where, as you know, over the last several years, it's been below 40% of our volumes, we think this is good evidence that it's heading back toward more traditional areas as well at least on a percentage basis, because as you recall, we typically range from 45% to 48%, not less than 40%. So if we're looking at that and we expect more public activity, we think that's actually very good. We think in those states it's very good. Here's what we also see, we're seeing more design-build work and design-build work typically means larger, more complicated projects. In many places, we see this replacing some P3 work, which we actually think is really quite good. So, from your perspective, Kathryn, they're larger jobs. They're more complicated jobs. Oftentimes, they have multiple primes. And those types of work are typically from the ground up. And what I mean by that is you'll see the entire array of aggregate products from base material at the very beginning of projects to clean stone as it's incorporated into asphalt or concrete as we go through. I think that's the biggest piece on infrastructure. We also feel good about non-res and we feel good about res. If we're looking at the Dodge Momentum Index, that and the ABI both remain positive. We're looking at the next large wave of multi-year energy projects coming into Texas, really, as we go into 2019. And the other thing that strikes us is, in Martin Marietta markets, housing still remains very strong. We're looking at housing numbers this year that are still well below the 50-year average of 1.5 million starts. We see that there's not enough new or existing homes available to meet current demand. We're talking with homebuilders and listening to their commentary as well and they're seeing strong housing fundamentals. And I think the other piece of it that's important is if you think about where the majority of our footprint is, it's southeastern and southwestern, and we feel like those geographies really offer superior opportunities for housing in the near term and the longer term. So I hope that answered both parts of your question, Kathryn.