Transporter
This project is an architectural response to social issues, materials issues, and urban issues. This project is about humanity and about community. This project is an alternative way to think about urban infill, the plethora of unused spaces and passive structures that occupy the urban landscape. This concept could be applied in any city. There are three elements that proliferate throughout our everyday lives and they go, for the most part, without notice; the billboard, the container and the homeless. The City of Seattle has 534 permitted billboards located on urban lots, each one with an address. Approximately 2 million containers move through the Port of Seattle every year. Every evening there are approximately 2,600 homeless without shelter or services. As objects, billboards are static and ubiquitous, and have an opportunity to do more than advertise. Their overdesigned structure could be used to support a transitional housing unit, TRANSporter, for people who could use a little structure, a little support, and an address. Containers were developed by the army during WWII and are the preferred method of shipping goods across the globe. Their standardized shape and steel structure and the ability to be easily moved, make them the perfect shell for this concept. For someone who has been homeless and is trying to piece their life back together, transitional housing provides stability, control of one’s life and self sufficiency. Conceptually, the project places a prototype TRANSporter in the Denny Triangle. This area was chosen for many reasons; close to the Seattle Housing Authority (presumed managing agency), close to a wide variety of public transportation services including the new light rail station, South Lake Union Streetcar and local and regional bus systems. It would be close to basic services such as a grocery store, a hardware store, emergency and medical services and it’s on the edge of the central business district. An existing billboard structure can easily accommodate a 20k dead load. The minimal lateral retrofit of the container can be handled with the proposed interior partition walls. Access to the TRANSporter would be provided by a construction hoist as they are designed to be mobile and exposed to the elements. A dwelling’s archetype is defined as a porch, sense of entry, space for a table and chairs, and natural light and materials. The exterior of the TRANSporter would be clad with horizontal wood siding. The windows would have horizontal wood slats to filter light and provide a screen. The interior ceiling and walls of the container would be framed with light gauge steel studs 24” O.C. with a HCFC free polyisocyanurate insulation for maximum insulation per inch with a 5/8” FSC plywood interior panel instead of gypsum board. The floor would be insulated from below with the same insulation as the ceiling and walls and the finish material would be a linoleum sheet good. Electricity would be provided by (8) 130 watt roof mounted PV panels. Water would be supplied with a city connection. Hot water would be supplied by a tankless water heater. The TRANSporter would be heated with radiant electric heating in the floor and cooling would be achieved with passive techniques. Human waste would be handled by a composting toilet and gray water would gravity flow to a holding tank. The TRANSporter’s adaptive reuse of existing structures and materials from an urban landscape applied in an infill capacity makes the alternative use of both materials and landscape a precedence.
View Images
