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  • From: yarrow@sfo.com
  • To: permaculture <permaculture@lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [permaculture] Retrofits
  • Date: Wed, 26 Sep 2007 20:18:25 -0700

At 9:07 AM -0400 9/26/07, KNat wrote:
Anyone work with retrofitting homes. Especially mobile homes and trailers.

Kathyann
_____

Here's an idea. I've also heard of several architects doing "green" modular and trailer homes.



http://www.aia.org/aiarchitect/thisweek07/0209/0209d_pw.cfm

Design Students Get Boxed In
Class project proposes empty shipping containers as livable spaces

by Russell Boniface
Associate Editor

Summary: One person's empty shipping crate can be another person's design treasure. At Cañada College in Redwood City, south of San Francisco, interior design students have created concepts for disaster and homeless housing incorporating imported-goods shipping containers. An 11-week class project, led by design instructor Annie Cronin, yielded creative designs that arrange and stack the spacious metal containers into low-cost, temporary communities.

In their creative design drawings, Cañada College students showed how empty, boxy shipping containers of metal and fiberglass could be used to provide temporary housing. The durable, box-shaped units, which measure 8 by 20 feet in plan and average about 10 feet high, can be use singly or merged into multi-unit complexes.

Students showed how empty, boxy shipping containers of metal and fiberglass could be used to provide temporary housing

The students used room layouts and amenities found in typical homes in their unit designs, including beds, bathroom and kitchen fixtures, hardwood floors, countertops, tiles, and microwaves. A planned community unit design showcased a garden, play area, pet park, clinic, space for laptops, a social-services facility, and laundry room. One design opened up the units to the outside with patios for more living space, a loft area, and green rooftop, while another featured computerized sun-tracking solar panels. Recycled and environmentally friendly materials were part of the student designs and included bamboo flooring, countertops and tiles, non-toxic fabrics, and low VOC paints.

Creative design solution for disaster relief, homelessness
"For this class, the focus was an interior for disaster relief housing, but the designs also could be for homeless shelters, too," says Cronin. "The assignment was one floor plan, two elevations, and one perspective of their units. I stressed LEED® and ways to get sustainable materials for their designs from within a 500-mile radius of the project, which included researching and specifying materials and finishes."

Cronin says goods in shipping containers arrive in port cities like San Francisco from places such as China, and then go back empty. Cronin thought the empty metal cubes could be put to better use. Her idea for the shipping container class project arose from the 100-year anniversary of the 1906 San Francisco earthquake. "After the earthquake, 3,000 cottages were built in Golden Gate Park, and in three weeks they had 3,000 people housed in them. At the anniversary event, there was a display of the old photographs, and on the opposing wall there were pictures of Hurricane Katrina showing that not much was done there. I thought that empty shipping containers could be a good class design project using a minimal amount of square footage and also be a creative design solution to disaster relief and homelessness, especially for areas like San Francisco and New Orleans with large ports.

Shipping containers arrive in port cities like San Francisco from places such as China, and then go back empty

"The empty containers could be purchased for $900; provide a roof, walls, and ceiling; and be used and accessed," Cronin explains. "The students showed how you would place them on a foundation, insulate them from the inside or outside, cut out openings for windows, and stack them on top of each other. The boxes are hurricane safe, up to 140 mph. There are architects now using the shipping containers for high-end construction."

Cronin believes that with so much pre-fabricated building, a container's rooms, ideally made from sustainable materials, could get "popped in" with kitchens, bathrooms, and bedrooms. The boxed units could be designed to include amenities like microwaves, skylights, and laptops.

Containing community
Cronin, who experienced her own major house fire, agrees with her students that shipping containers turned into a planned community could help displaced people put their lives back together through a sense of community. "[After the fire] we were able to rent a house in our neighborhood, and nearby there was a school and support system. My kids and I didn't need to be in a motel for seven months," she said.

Cañada College offers four different design classes for a green design certificate. Cronin said she was impressed with her student's creativity and sustainable awareness during the shipping container design project. "I was blown away."


Palo Alto Weekly

May 25, 2007
http://www.paloaltoonline.com/weekly/story.php?story_id=5386
Real Estate - Friday, May 25, 2007

Emergency, eco-friendly housing
Interior design students construct homes out of metal storage containers

by Justin Bull

Annie Cronin presented an unusual problem to her green design and sustainable concepts class at Canada College last semester: How can you turn an 8- x 20-foot metal storage container into a comfortable, eco-friendly home?

Transforming storage containers into affordable housing units has become a recent trend among innovative architects. Cronin used the creative idea as her final class project last November, having her students design models that turned the containers into livable one-to-two-person homes.

"It would be very easy to put these together quickly in case of a disaster," Cronin said of the practicality of the project.

The shipping containers exhibit several attractive, homey qualities, according to a Canada College press release. They are readily available, empty and can be purchased for about $900. They are also strong enough to withstand winds of up to 170 miles per hour.

Because the class was a "green" design course, Cronin encouraged her interior-design students to use every eco-friendly idea possible to create a livable space out of the used metal crates, and she was pleasantly surprised with the results.

"They did some great stuff," she said.

Student ideas included energy-efficient heating systems, skylights and multiple-floor homes with roof gardens, she said. One student developed a complex solar-power system that made the container self-sufficient.

"I was really surprised," Cronin said. "This particular project brought out a lot more creativity than other ones."

One of the most eco-friendly plans involved radiant floor heating, Cronin said. A radiant-floor heating design runs plastic tubing under the shipping container and heats water that passes through the pipes. It's a heating process that's much more efficient than venting in gas-heated air, Cronin said.

The idea for the project was born after Cronin witnessed the poorly planned response to Hurricane Katrina, as well as a recent display of the aftermath of the San Francisco earthquake in 1906. After the quake, thousands of temporary housing units were built in only three weeks, she said.

"I wanted to have students do a project in response to something that was done better than Hurricane Katrina. So many people were homeless and devastated and getting shipped all over the country because there was nothing for them," she said.

Those who participated reacted positively to the project, including Kit Golson, an interior designer with Redwood City-based Catherine Cunningham Interior Design, who is working on a certificate in green design.

"I enjoyed it tremendously," Golson said of the project. "I thought it was really interesting."

Her project consisted of an entire community of shipping container homes that would preserve the social setting of a neighborhood. She added high-transom windows and ecologically friendly linoleum flooring to the shipping containers, and the surrounding community included a dog park, a medical clinic and support services.

In Golson's units, she chose to minimize the kitchen and have no laundry, while emphasizing use of a community kitchen and clothesline. "This is to encourage community participation and to have less environmental impact. I suggested the funds be diverted to a laptop for each shelter to stay in touch with the larger world, to manage finances/job issues, and for retraining if needed," she added.

"I tried to put myself in the position of someone surviving Katrina," she said. "If communities like these could have been put up it would have kept each community together more."

Although shipping containers wouldn't necessarily make ideal homes, if modified they could be welcome shelters for those with few alternatives, Golson said.

"It seems like the government should take a good look at these," she said. "It would be an excellent way to reuse substantive material, instead of letting them pile up and erode."

Cronin added that while her project used the containers only as temporary homes, people out there are turning them into permanent housing structures.

Cronin hopes that disaster responses become more efficient and that environmental consciousness continues to grow.

"The more press something like this gets -- in terms of getting people to pay attention to their environment -- the better," she said.




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