‘“Wherever I can work, I’ve got to go”: negotiating mobilities in the context of volatility in the Canadian construction industry’

ABSTRACT

This article considers how construction workers based in the Canadian province of Newfoundland and Labrador (NL) negotiate the need to be mobile for work at different scales and with what effects. It tackles the seldom considered question of how travel becomes normalized as a facet of work in construction, an employment sector characterized by volatility. Specifically, we explore the experiences of workers and their families negotiating the shift from having extensive employment options in different places during a time of high labour demand, to limited and constrained options that may require significant changes (for instance, relocation, more time apart from family, or lower pay) in a period of economic contraction. How workers respond to these conditions contributes to conceptualizations of agency and mobility in construction workplace cultures. The article draws on 73 semi-structured interviews with workers, employers and industry and community stakeholders conducted between 2014 and 2018, and data from project employment reports and field observations. The article reveals how long commutes and extended periods away from home are understood to be inevitable aspects of construction work that shape the field of expectations of workers and their families, and what this dominant discourse means on the ground in lived experience.

KEYWORDS:

• Long-distance commuting
• Construction workforce
• Mobilities
• Agency

Acknowledgments

We thank our interviewees for their participation in the research. Barbara Neis and two anonymous reviewers provided comments that helped to improve the argument and tighten the focus of the article. The On the Move Partnership provided various kinds of support.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1. Rotations or rosters vary widely from several days in a row followed by days off, to weeks of work every day with no break. In this article rotations are notated as n-n, referring to days on-days off. The rotations refer to days rather than weeks, unless otherwise noted.

2. Prefabricated modules are an exception and represent an area of present and future growth that makes off-site construction possible in some circumstances (Veen et al. 2017).

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada [Partnership Grant Appl.ID 895-2011-1019].

Notes on contributors

Lachlan Barber

Lachlan Barber is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Geography at Hong Kong Baptist University. He conducts research in Hong Kong and Canada on mobilities and the politics of heritage.

Samantha Breslin

Samantha Breslin is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Anthropology and associated with the Centre for Social Data Science at the University of Copenhagen. Her research centres on the production of inequalities, norms, and values, particularly in relation to gender and political economy, with a focus on computing and data cultures.