Re: What does containerized housing look like?
From: Lion Kuntz (lionkuntzyahoo.com)
Date: Fri, 22 Sep 2006 00:22:43 -0700 (PDT)

--- Brian Bartholomew <bb [at] stat.ufl.edu> wrote:
> 
> I get giggles in my forming coho group for wanting to self-build a
> house using oceangoing shipping containers as a building block.  I
> expect it to have an unconventional appearance.  I also expect it to
> cost less than $20K for the house only.  Most of the real objections
> have centered around 'few people want to look at that', which is
> expected to hurt the prospects of mortgages and resales for others.
> 
> May I invite cohos with scrounged and nontraditional houses to talk a
> little about the actual, observed consequences of such buildings on
> the financial lifecycle of more traditionally designed units?
> 
>                                                       Brian

Orginally conceived as "affordable" rental housing these prefab
containerized units were made of steel-rebar reinforced concrete. Some
time later the tenants association voted to go condo and now the units
sell for up to $1.8 million. However that price reflects joining four
previously seperated dwellings into one split-level mansion.

Today's photo study is a particularly ugly example giving terraced
housing a bad name.

http://ecosyn.us/1/Habitat_67/Habitat_67.html


Habitat 67 2600 Avenue Pierre-Dupuy, Montreal, QC, Canada
Google Satellite views
http://snipurl.com/pmy8

http://naid.sppsr.ucla.edu/expo67/map-docs/habitat67.htm
Habitat 67
Habitat 67, an experiment in apartment living, became the permanent
symbol of Expo 67 after it closed. It was Canadian architect Moshe
Safdie's experiment to make a fundamentally better and cheaper housing
for the masses. He attempted to make a revolution in the way homes were
built - by the industrialization of the building process; essentially
factory mass production. He felt that it was more efficient to make
buildings in factories and deliver them prefabricated to the site.

Habitat's 158 living units resembled a Taos Indian pueblo.

... While factory production techniques should have cut overall costs,
building 158 apartments isn't really productive in factory work since
there is often a steep learning curve. Also since the individual units
would bear the weight load of the units above, the units on the bottom
where actually thicker and stronger. In the end Habitat 67 cost
$22,195,920, or about $140,000 per living unit. Effectively that was
the same cost as building six-eight ordinary town houses. Luckily one
could rationalize that it was only a prototype, and if scaled up, it
might be much cheaper to construct.


http://www.habitat67.com/


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Habitat_'67
Habitat '67 is a striking housing complex located in Montreal, Quebec,
Canada, on the Quai Marc-Drouin on the Saint Lawrence River. It was
designed by architect Moshe Safdie based on his master's thesis at
McGill University.
Habitat 67 in Montreal winter
Enlarge
Habitat 67 in Montreal winter

It was designed to integrate the variety and diversity of scattered
private homes with the economics and density of a modern apartment
building. Modular, interlocking concrete forms define the space. The
complex was built as part of Expo '67. The project was designed to
create affordable housing with close but private quarters, each
equipped with a garden. The complex was originally meant to be vastly
larger. It also failed in its goal of being affordable as the building
is today quite elite. It is now a privately-owned condominium complex
since it was purchased by its tenants in 1985.

Safdie hoped that his vision of interlocking modules would become
widespread. However Safdie's attempts to build similar structures
elsewhere in the world all failed to be funded.


http://cac.mcgill.ca/safdie/habitat/showphotos.htm
http://cac.mcgill.ca/safdie/habitat/


http://www.greatbuildings.com/buildings/Habitat_67.html

http://www.flickr.com/photos/denmar/124051003/

http://ecosyn.us/1/Habitat_67/Habitat_67.html

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Sincerely, Lion Kuntz
Santa Rosa, California, USA
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