USGBC Natural Talent Design Competition 2009 - Kansas City Chapter

COMPETITION CHALLENGE
Design a prototypical emergency housing unit (EHU) with an ISO Standard 9’-6” (h)x 8’-0” (w) x 40’-0” (d) shipping container. The emergency housing units (EHU) are to be designed to be self contained housing that can be loaded and shipped throughout the United States or internationally at a moment’s notice.

With the nature of trade in the United States, more is being shipped in than shipped out. This is leaving major intermodal ports with an over abundance of shipping containers. Intermodal shipping utilizes special containers or trailers which allow goods to be moved directly from one mode of transportation to another without having to be repacked. Kansas City is considered an intermodal port. The designed EHU’s are to utilize LEED for New Construction strategies.

Site: There is no specific site for this competition. However, for this competition a 25’-0” x 50’-0” generic site will be utilized with an assumed North South orientation, though the EHU units should be adaptable to any site.

PROJECT CONTEXT & LOCATION
EHU’s can be built and shipped anywhere in the world; therefore there is no traditional project context or location to which to design. So the intended context for the design should be the cultural context of the region that the EHU’s would be intended. For the purpose of this competition that region will be the Gulf Coast of the United States.

Brief (PDF)