New York—Reed Business Information confirmed Friday that it is closing 13 of the 14 regional construction magazines that were part of its Associated Construction Publications unit.

The company said Reed Construction Data will continue to publish Construction Equipment, Minnesota Construction Bulletin and several construction Web sites.

“The final issues will be published during April and affected staff will unfortunately be leaving the company during the course of the month,” Reed Business Information said in a statement. “It has become increasingly clear that ACP’s hybrid business model of regional/national advertising is economically unsustainable.”

“Given where the construction industry is headed and the near-term outlook—and [that] coupled with the difficulty of getting long-term investment from strategic and financial players—it’s not surprising that Reed closed these titles,” said Roland DeSilva, co-managing partner of media investment bank DeSilva & Phillips. “In addition, the competitive publishing landscape in that market had to play a role.”

“I think it’s premature,” said an industry observer who spoke on condition of anonymity. “I don’t know the particular economics of the publications, but there are a lot of publications in this country that take regional and national advertising that work. To shut down these publications in an industry that is struggling but will undoubtedly come back is premature.”