HULL

Sustainable solutions for forward thinkers.

April 2010 Issue 2

Redesigning Detroit?

The New Modular Construction

Design Backwards

Design Thinking

ART DIRECTOR Andy Luce

SENIOR EDITOR Aaron bromirski

EDITOR Eric Hires

MANAGER Megan James

PRODUCTION DIRECTOR Nathan Edwards

CIRCULATION DIRECTOR Caroline Holland

OFFICE ADMINISTRATION ADMINISTRATI Brian Davis

CUSTOMER SERVICE Michele Obama

CREATIVE CONSULTANTS Ninja Turtles

DESIGN THINKING

01

Using what we do best to work for what the world really needs, not just what it wants. { Why Henry brought us cars and not faster horses }

09

DESIGNING BACKWARDS From the landfill to your desk, how we can practice sustainable solutions by reversing our process.

REDESIGNING DETROIT

13

A look into a semi-abandoned city and some possible options to consider. Why a family day of apple picking in downtown Detroit may not be far off.

19

THE NEW MODULAR CONSTRUCTION

Shipping containers have become the perfect sustainable construction material.

An in-depth look at the new container home phenomenon.

POLICY

25 26

The highspeed rail, may finally be picking up some speed in North America.

NEW PRODUCT

The Peepoo bag, a sustainable and sanitary solution to one of the third World's great problems.

While minimizing our impact { + views on faster horses }

01 > 02

In an area outside Hyderabad, India,

between the suburbs and

the countryside, a young

woman—we’ll call her

Shanti—fetches water

daily from the always-

open local borehole that

is about 300 feet from her home. She uses a

3-gallon plastic container that she can easily carry

on her head. Shanti and

her husband rely on

the free water for their

drinking and washing, and though they’ve

heard that it’s not as

safe as water from the

Naandi Foundation-run community treatment

plant, they still use it.

Shanti’s family has been drinking the local water for generations, and

although it periodically

makes her and her family

sick, she has no plans to stop using it.

Shanti has many reasons not to use the water from the Naandi treatment center, but they’re not the reasons one might think. The center is within easy walking distance of her th e an y ne home—roughly a third of a mile. It is also well d be wa ed. known and affordable (roughly 10 rupees, or “ th mo ste Wh e r yw m 20 cents, for 5 gallons). Being able to pay on Th cen e lik ely ey ould e t the small fee has even become a status e to co ra I to ?” m m llow pu ask buy su pro symbol for some villagers. Habit isn’t u d cc ed rch s S m n u i it c o e t a factor, either. Shanti is forgoing wo ede e c y tre her ase han re t co t l i d a t t e , a han he o t a the safer water because of a m rks m v n dd m or en buy I N we ery a u tc les aan ing nee series of flaws in the overall tre olde nity, ll f wel nd e d s po nte s. la i w he d rs at pa or m design of the system. ’ at en ons rtic ma t do tabl r wa er d ing e ula ny tp s w i Although Shanti can walk to the facility, f lan ho rl pe jus wate des ig td o yf o she can’t carry the 5-gallon jerrican that ur wn ami ple t tha r, a ned ing nd bik lies t. l i the facility requires her to use. When filled v ing In wo es wi fa it t a rk ct, with water, the plastic rectangular container is ing nd h hu in ho can sba the simply too heavy. The container isn’t designed ur s. visi nds tt to be held on the hip or the head, where she he likes to carry heavy objects. Shanti’s husband can’t help carry it, either. He works in the city and doesn’t return home until after the water treatment center is closed. The treatment center also requires them to buy a monthly punch card for 5 gallons a day, far more than

words // Tim Brown & Jocelyn Wyatt

Traditionally, designers

focused their attention on improving the look and

functionality of products.

Classic examples of this type of design work are

Apple Computer’s iPod and Herman Miller’s

Aeron chair.

The designers of the center, however, missed the opportunity to design an even better system because they failed to consider the culture and needs of all of the people living in the community.

The designers of the center, however, missed the opportunity to design an even better system because they failed to consider the culture and needs of every person living in the community.

This missed opportunity, although an obvious omission in hindsight, is all too common. Time and again, initiatives falter because they are not based on the client’s or customer’s needs and have never been prototyped to solicit feedback. Even when people do go into the field, they may enter with preconceived notions of what the needs and solutions are. This flawed approach remains the norm in both the business and social sectors.

As Shanti’s situation shows, social challenges require systemic solutions that are grounded in the client’s or customer’s needs. This is where many approaches founder, but it is where design thinking—a new approach to creating solutions—excels.

In recent years designers have broadened their approach, creating entire systems to deliver products and services.

Design thinking incorporates constituent or consumer insights in depth and rapid prototyping, all aimed at getting beyond the assumptions that block effective solutions. Design thinking, inherently optimistic, constructive, and experiential, addresses the needs of the people who will consume a product or service and the infrastructure that enables it.

Businesses are embracing design thinking because it helps them be more innovative, better differentiate their brands, and bring their products and services to market faster.

Nonprofits are beginning to use design thinking as well to develop better solutions

to social problems. Design thinking crosses the traditional boundaries between public, for-profit, and nonprofit sectors. By working closely with the clients and consumers, design thinking allows high-impact solutions to bubble up from below rather than being imposed from the top.

Design Thinking at Work Jerry Sternin, founder of the Positive Deviance Initiative and an associate professor at Tufts University until he died last year, was skilled at identifying what and critical of what he called outsider solutions to local problems. Sternin’s preferred approach to social innovation is an example of design thinking in action.1 In 1990, Sternin and his wife, Monique, were invited by the government of Vietnam to develop a model to decrease in a sustainable manner high levels of malnutrition among children in 10,000 villages. At the time, 65 percent of Vietnamese children under age 5 suffered from malnutrition, and most solutions relied on government and UN agencies donations of nutritional supplements. But the supplements—the outsider solution—never delivered the hopedfor results. As an alternative, the Sternins 03 > 04

used an approach called positive deviance, which looks for existing solutions (hence sustainable) among individuals and families in the community who are already doing well.

The Sternins and colleagues from Save the Children surveyed four local Quong Xuong communities in the province of Than Hoa and asked for examples of “very, very poor” families whose children were healthy. They then observed the food preparation, cooking, and serving behaviors of these six families, called “positive deviants,” and found a few consistent yet rare behaviors. Parents of wellnourished children collected tiny shrimps,

crabs, and snails from rice paddies and added them to the food, along with the greens from sweet potatoes. Although these foods were readily available, they were typically not eaten because they were considered unsafe for children. The positive deviants also fed their children multiple smaller meals, which allowed small stomachs to hold and digest more food each day.

The Sternins and the rest of their group worked with the positive deviants to offer cooking classes to the families of children suffering from malnutrition. By the end of the program’s first year, 80 percent of the 1,000 children enrolled

As Monique Sternin,

One program that might have benefited from design thinking is mosquito net distribution in Africa. The nets are well designed and when used are effective at reducing the incidence of malaria. The World Health Organization praised the nets, crediting them with significant drops in malaria deaths in children under age 5: a 51 percent decline in Ethiopia, 34 percent decline in Ghana, and 66 percent decline in Rwanda. The way that the mosquito nets have been distributed, however, has had unintended consequences. In northern Ghana, for instance, nets are provided free to pregnant women and mothers with children under age 5. These women can readily pick up free nets from local public hospitals. For everyone else, however, the nets are difficult to obtain. When we asked a well-educated Ghanaian named Albert, who had recently contracted malaria, whether he slept under a mosquito net, he told us no—there was no place in the city of Tamale to purchase one. Because so many people can obtain free nets, it is not profitable for shop owners to sell them. But hospitals are not equipped to sell additional nets, either.

As Albert’s experience shows, it’s critical that the people designing a program consider not only form and function, but distribution channels as well. One could say that the free nets were never intended for people like Albert—that he was simply out of the scope of the project.

But that would be missing a huge opportunity.

Without considering the whole system, the nets cannot be widely distributed, which makes the eradication of malaria impossible.

now director of the Positive Deviance

Initiative, explains: “Both positive

deviance and design

thinking are human-

centered approaches.

Their solutions are

relevant to a unique

cultural context and will not necessarily

work outside that

specific situation.”

in the program were adequately nourished. In addition, the effort had been replicated within 14 villages across Vietnam.

The Sternins’ work is a good example of how positive deviance and design thinking relies on local expertise to uncover local solutions.

Design thinkers look for work-arounds and improvise solutions—like the shrimps, crabs, and snails—and they find ways to incorporate those into the offerings they create. They consider what we call the edges, the places where “extreme” people live differently, think differently, and consume differently.

51% 34 % 66 % Without considering the whole system, the nets cannot be widely distributed, which makes the eradication of malaria impossible.

As an approach,

design thinking taps into capacities we all have but that

are overlooked by

The Origin of Design Thinking IDEO was formed in 1991 as a merger between David Kelley Design, which created Apple Computer’s first mouse in 1982, and ID Two, which designed the first laptop computer, also in 1982. Initially, IDEO focused on traditional design work for business, designing products like the Palm V personal digital assistant, Oral-B toothbrushes, and Steelcase chairs. These are the types of objects that are displayed in lifestyle magazines or on pedestals in modern art museums.

By 2001, IDEO was increasingly being asked to tackle problems that seemed far afield from traditional design. A healthcare foundation asked us to help restructure its organization, a century-old manufacturing company wanted to better understand its clients, and a university hoped to create alternative learning environments to traditional classrooms. This type of work took IDEO from designing consumer products to designing consumer experiences.

To distinguish this new type of design work, we began referring to it as “design with a small d.”

But this phrase never seemed fully satisfactory.

David Kelley, also the founder of Stanford University’s Hasso Plattner Institute of Design (aka the “d.school”), remarked that every time someone asked him about design, he found himself inserting the word “thinking” to explain what it was that designers do. Eventually, the term design thinking stuck.7 As an approach, design thinking taps into capacities we all have but that are overlooked by more conventional problem-solving practices. Not only does it focus on creating products and services that are human centered, but the process itself is also deeply human. Design thinking relies on our ability to be intuitive, to recognize patterns, to construct ideas that have emotional meaning as well as being functional, and to express ourselves in media other than words or symbols. Nobody wants to run an organization on feeling, intuition, and inspiration, but an over-reliance on the rational and the analytical can be just as risky. Design thinking, the integrated approach at the core of the design process, provides a third way.

more conventional problem-solving

practices. Not only does it focus on

creating products

and services that are human centered, but the process itself is also deeply human.

The design thinking process is best thought of as a system of overlapping spaces rather than a sequence of orderly steps. There are three spaces to keep in mind: inspiration, ideation, and implementation. Think of inspiration as the problem or opportunity that motivates the search for solutions; ideation as the process of generating, developing, and testing ideas; and implementation as the path that leads from the project stage into people’s lives.

Design thinking relies on our ability to be intuitive, to recognize patterns, to construct ideas that have emotional meaning as well as being functional, and to express ourselves in media other than words or symbols.

05 > 06

Once the brief has been constructed, it is time for the design team to discover what people’s needs are.

Traditional ways of doing this, such as focus groups and surveys, rarely yield important insights. In most cases, these techniques simply ask people what they want. Conventional research can be useful in pointing toward incremental improvements, but those don’t usually lead to the type of breakthroughs that leave us scratching our heads and wondering why nobody ever thought of that before. Henry Ford understood this when he said, “If I’d asked my customers what they wanted, they’d have said ‘a faster horse.’”

The design thinking process is best thought of as a system of overlapping spaces rather than a sequence of orderly steps. There are three spaces to keep in mind: inspiration, ideation, and implementation. Think of inspiration as the problem or opportunity that motivates the search for solutions; ideation as the process of generating, developing, and testing ideas; and implementation as the path that leads from the project stage into people’s lives.

The reason to call these spaces, rather than steps, is that they are not always undertaken sequentially. Projects may loop back through inspiration, ideation, and implementation more than once as the team refines its ideas and explores new directions. Not surprisingly, design thinking can feel chaotic to those doing it for the first time. But over the life of a project, participants come to see that the process makes sense and achieves results, even though its form differs from the linear, milestone-based processes that organizations typically undertake.

site to connect rural Rwandan weavers with the world. Pecknold soon discovered that the weavers had little or no access to computers and the Internet. Rather than ask them to maintain a Web site, she reframed the brief, broadening it to ask what services could be provided to the community to help them improve

their

livelihoods.

Pecknold

used

various design thinking techniques, drawing

Inspiration Although it is true that designers do not always proceed through each of the three spaces in linear fashion, it is generally the case that the design process begins with the inspiration space—the problem or opportunity that motivates people to search for solutions.

And the classic starting point for the inspiration phase is the brief. The brief is a set of mental constraints that gives the project team a framework from which to begin, benchmarks by which they can measure progress, and a set of objectives to be realized—such as price point, available technology, and market segment.

But just as a hypothesis is not the same as an algorithm, the brief is not a set of instructions or an attempt to answer the question before it has been posed. Rather, a well-constructed brief allows for serendipity, unpredictability, and the capricious whims of fate—the creative realm from which breakthrough ideas emerge.

Too abstract and the brief risks leaving the project team wandering; too narrow a set of constraints almost guarantees that the outcome will be incremental and, likely, mediocre.

Once the brief has been constructed, it is time for the design team to discover what people’s needs are. Traditional ways of doing this, such as focus groups and surveys, rarely yield important insights. In most cases, these techniques simply ask people what they want. Conventional research can be useful in pointing toward incremental improvements, but those don’t usually lead to the type of breakthroughs that leave us scratching our heads and wondering why nobody ever thought of that before.

Henry Ford understood this when he said, “If I’d asked my customers what they wanted, they’d

partly from her training and partly from ideo’s

Although people

Human Centered Design toolkit, to understand

often can’t tell us

the women’s aspirations.

their actual behaviors

language, she asked them to document their

invaluable clues

pictures that expressed what success looked

unmet needs.

the women were able to see for themselves

what their needs are,

Because Pecknold didn’t speak the women’s

can provide us with

lives and aspirations with a camera and draw

about their range of

like in their community. Through these activities, what was important and valuable, rather than having an outsider make those assumptions for them. During the project, Pecknold also provided each participant with the equivalent of a day’s wages (500 francs, or roughly $1)

have said ‘a faster horse.’” Although people often can’t tell us what their needs are, their actual behaviors can provide us with invaluable clues about their range of unmet needs.

A better starting point is for designers to go out into the world and observe the actual experiences of smallholder farmers, schoolchildren, and community health workers as they improvise their way through their daily lives. Working with local partners who serve as interpreters and cultural guides is also important, as well as having partners make introductions to communities, helping build credibility quickly and ensuring understanding.

Through “homestays” and shadowing locals at their jobs and in their homes, design thinkers become embedded in the lives of the people they are designing for.

Earlier this year, Kara Pecknold, a student at Emily Carr University of Art and Design in Vancouver, British Columbia, took an internship with a women’s cooperative in Rwanda. Her task was to develop a Web

to see what each person did with the money.

Doing this gave her further insight into the people’s lives and aspirations. Meanwhile, the women found that a mere 500 francs a day could be a significant, life-changing sum. This visualization process helped both Pecknold and the women prioritize their planning for the community.

07 > 08

Beginning with the project’s ultimate destination, which is usuallly a landfill, Designer Brian Dougherty explains that designers must take a mental journey to work backwards until they end up in their own design studio. s’tcejorp eht htiw gninnigeB si hcihw ,noitanitsed etamitlu nairB rengiseD ,llifdnal a ylllausu taht snialpxe ytrehguoD latnem a ekat tsum srengised litnu sdrawkcab krow ot yenruoj ngised nwo rieht ni pu dne yeht Buttons // Pad // Button Casing

Plug // 6 ft. Cord

Top Casing

Speaker

Front Panel

Tuner

Tuner Set // Dial // Dial Inner

Bottom Casing

Alarm Switch

09 >

WASTE Design for destiny: Consider reuse Recyclability Compost ability

USER User experience Add value through design Educate Enable Action

DELIVERY Design for distribution Explore efficient packing Stripping away layers Alternate distribution

Agree upon a set of end-of-flife targets. This informs every part of the design.

How to add value to somone’s life?

How to pack tightly?

Efficiently deliver at every step of the process.

WAREHOUSE Consider print on demand Perform actual usage audit

BINDERY Consider mechanical bindings Eliminate trim waste

PRINTING Design for green printing Explore recycled paper Design press sheets Consider digital printing UV inks: Low VOC printing

Wasting space, is waste.

For example, a round package can be spiral wound paper, and then cut, which will eliminate any die cut trim.

Designers must take a mental journey to work backwards until they end up in their own design studio. This process ensures they take into account disposal, the user experience, delivery of the material, warehousing, binding and printing.

For instance, Polypropylene is rec om ended over paper or PET because is results in more pure recycled flake.

“We learned about systems thinking, and began looking at design as a system rather than an artifact. We realized if you could just adjust the system, so that the artifact is done right, you can make a much bigger impact on the world.

That got us into a way of thinking that ten years later would be called the Green Business movement.”

Back in 1997 designer Brian Dougherty

“The status quo is not good enough,” he

was reading Paul Hawkin’s book, The

says. “You can’t make a little impact.”

Ecology of Commerce, and wondering

Dougherty calls his recipe for systemic

why no one in the graphic design commu-

design thinking, Designing Backwards.

nity was embracing Hawkin’s call to arms.

As illustrated in his book, Green Graphic

“I looked around,” Dougherty remembers

Design, Designing Backwards turns the

“and wondered, why wasn’t this happen-

traditional graphic design process on its

ing?” So he started Celery Design Col-

head. Beginning with the project’s ultimate

laborative as a sustainable design firm and

destination, which is usually a landfill,

“through pure luck” ended up working with

Dougherty explains that designers must

Hawkin and The Natural Step, a Swedish

take a mental journey to work backwards

nonprofit that promotes a set of guiding

until they end up in their own design

sustain ability principles based on laws of

studio. This process ensures they take into

thermodynamics and natural cycles.

account disposal, the user experience,

Celery created an identity system for

delivery of the material, warehousing, bind-

The Natural Step, as well as information

ing and printing.

graphics, collateral and communications.

“Systems thinking,” which examines the

“It was a formative experience,” recalls

entire production process - from sourcing

Dougherty. Today Celery has a seat at the

of raw materials to manufacturing, packag-

table with companies around the world,

ing, shipping, marketing, retailing, and

helping make decisions from business

recycling - Dougherty says, “is a powerful

strategy though the design of the aesthetic

way to make a big impact.”

artifact, manufacturing and production, all the way to the landfill. Dougherty believes designers can no longer look at designing artifacts in isolation while the current system of production remains status quo.

11 > 12

WHAT SHOULD WE DO WITH A SEMI-ABANDONED U.S. CITY? We’ve never had a situation quite like Detroit in modern American history: A major U.S. city, once the fourth largest in the country, losing over half of its population in a few decades, following the collapse of its principal industry.

13 > 14

So what should we do with all that empty space?

One option, according to some groups, is build farms. Fortune reports that a movement is growing to turn Detroit into an urban agriculture experiment: There’s the problem of what to do with the city’s enormous amount of abandoned land, conservatively estimated at 40 square miles in a sprawling metropolis whose 139-square-mile footprint is easily bigger than San Francisco, Boston, and Manhattan combined. If you let it revert to nature, you abandon all hope of productive use. If you turn it over to parks and recreation, you add costs to an overburdened city government that can’t afford to teach its children, police its streets, or maintain the infrastructure it already has.

Faced with those facts, a growing number of policymakers and urban planners have begun to endorse farming as a solution. Former HUD secretary Henry Cisneros, now chairman of CityView, a private equity firm that invests in urban development, is familiar with Detroit’s land problem. He says he’s in favor of “other uses that engage human beings in their maintenance, such as urban agriculture.”

After studying the city’s options at the request of civic leaders, the American Institute of Architects came to this conclusion in a recent report: “Detroit is particularly well suited to become a pioneer in urban agriculture at a commercial scale.”

Farms in the middle of Detroit? The idea may not be so far fetched, according to money manager and Detroit resident John Hantz, who is developing an ambitious city-farm project: Hantz’s operation will bear little resemblance to a traditional farm. Mike Score, who recently left Michigan State’s agricultural extension program to join Hantz Farms as president, has written a business plan that calls for the deployment of the latest in farm technology, from compostheated greenhouses to hydroponic (water only, no soil) and aeroponic (air only) growing systems designed to maximize productivity in cramped settings.

He’s really excited about apples. Hantz Farms will use a trellised system that’s compact, highly efficient, and tourist-friendly. It won’t be like apple picking in Massachusetts, and that’s the point. Score wants visitors to Hantz Farms to see that agriculture is not just something that takes place in the countryside. They will be able to “walk down the row pushing a baby stroller,” he promises.

Crop selection will depend on the soil conditions of the plots that Hantz acquires. Experts insist that most of the land is not irretrievably toxic.

The majority of the lots now vacant in Detroit were residential, not industrial; the biggest problem is how compacted the soil is. For the most part the farms will focus on high-margin edibles: peaches, berries, plums, nectarines,

15 > 16

It’s unlikely that the city will ever return to its former population, particularly given the incredible crime and poverty that has pervaded Detroit in recent years. In fact, experts estimate that Detroit’s population will bottom out — and possibly remain — at around 700,000 people, all in a sprawling metropolis that can hold three times that number.

and exotic greens. Score says that the first crops are likely to be lettuce and heirloom tomatoes. Of course, there’s the matter of cost: Hantz is talking about putting up $30 million of his own money to finance the project, and it’s unclear how long it would take before he could expect to turn a profit. Most of the food-growing gardens would be very small (around a quarter of an acre) meaning that mass production and distribution could be a logistical nightmare.

Still, as Hantz told Fortune, “That’s the beauty of being down and out…You can actually open your mind to ideas that you would never otherwise embrace.”

17 > 18

Arguably the perfect example of sustainable construction and offsite methodology, the use of storage containers for building design has been one of the most intriguing developments in recent years.

19 > 20

Taking the use of containers beyond storage and the site canteen has created a step change in architectural thinking and at the same time delivered the ultimate piece of offsite construction.

Living in a box has never seemed so sexy. Or indeed having an office, artist’s studio, youth centre or fashionable retail space seemed quite so hip. Much of this is due to the trailblazing use of one of the most commonly seen parts of industrial life - the ubiquitous storage container.

Taking the use of containers beyond storage and the site canteen has created a step change in architectural thinking and at the same time delivered the ultimate piece of offsite construction. Of course, they are nothing new and have been around for some time. There are many container developments in Australia, the USA and New Zealand in particular. In South Africa there have been a number of

containerbased

schools

including

the world’s largest container based building; built in 1998 on the slopes of the Simonsberg Mountain in Cape Town, Simonstown High School Hostel, used 40 containers to house 120 boarders and is built on eleven different levels.

The components could not be easier to deal with. The sturdy stressed steel boxes come in a series of standard sizes - eight ft wide, eight ft high and in lengths of 10, 20

21 > 22

The system is a fast. inexpensive method of creating funky modern buildings in an environmentally friendly way. The base module is cheap adaptable, durable. transportable and reusable.

or 40ft and can withstand the knocks and bangs of being hauled all over the world as freight. However they are relatively light, weighing between 1.5 to 3.3 metric tonnes means they can easily be transported to just about anywhere.

The steel used is corrosion resistant. so on average they only need a lick of paint every five to seven years. In addition, the containers can easily be raised on stilts above ground level making them particularly useful in areas that are under ood risk.

Access is important. A mobile-crane needs unobstructed access of around 30ft from the middle of the container to the middle of the vehicle for perfect manoeuvrability, and any overhead cable lower than 18ft is likely to get in the way and cause problems. One of the overriding plus points of container construction is the minimal foundation work. Because of their relative light weight they do not impose on the ground heavily.

They can be safely placed on a lawn as long as the weight is distributed evenly over its footprint. Certainly for use on contaminated sites, the fact that the ground can remain virtually undisturbed and simply capped

over, cuts huge decontamination and landfill costs as well save valuable build time. Here in the UK, containers have been creating a stir since one of the first developments was built at Trinity Buoy Wharf in 2000 (basically 12 self contained studio workshops) Since then, the system has steadily grown to provide a variety of different building uses and could prove to be a perfect solution to the affordable housing and key worker accommodation crisis that continues to plague London and the South-East.

Not far from the entrance to the Blackwell Tunnel in East London, a three-storey office block is made entirely from recycled containers.

The series of

containers have had circular windows cut into the ribbed skin to encourage large amounts of natural light to enter the units whilst retaining their structural integrity.

endless number of projects in any type

design planning foundations and services

of configuration. Also. the nature of the

- making them very cost effective. The

The container doors are strong enough

container flatness makes them perfect

interior is normally finished with a anti-

to

These

breeding grounds for the use of sedum and

condensation layer, then a layer of mineral

are supported by a steel frame with

provide

built-in

balconies.

brown roof solutions making them havens

wool is added before being dry-lined out

conventional patio doors fitted into the

for biodiversity.

with plasterboard.

openings. The container’s foundations

“This modular technology provides both a

consist of small 300mm deep concrete

green and affordable solution to Britain’s

Commercial containers come from a

pads beneath the strengthened corner

housing

range of locations and are usually sourced

posts of each ground level container.

Managing

crisis.”

says

Eric

Reynolds.

Space

from the many that have been ‘retired’ at

Management (USM), the pioneer behind

Felixstowe, Liverpool, Southampton and

Critics point to the angular Lego-like

Container City. “The system is a fast.

Thamesport. Quality or quantity are not

appearance, but effectively this is the

inexpensive method of creating funky

usually a problem. Containers are ISO

way in which they pack an architectural

modern buildings in an environmentally friendly

certified for integrity on a regular basis but

punch. The container concept delivers an

way. The base module is cheap adaptable,

they do differ slightly between manufacturers

durable. transportable and reusable.”

- most are made in the Far East - so similar

Director

of

Urban

containers are used for each building On a prepared site, costs are estimated

depending on design requirements. As for

to be around £650-£700 per sq m, minus

numbers - it is estimated that approximately 300 million containers are in circulation around the globe at anyone time.

Also, proximity to container centres alters the price. In Scotland and Ireland - where there are smaller shipping volumes - the availability is smaller and the price of containers is higher. but on average, a used but useable 40 It unit costs around £1,000, a 20ft unit for a round £800.

As all regular readers will know onsite construction can be messy, wasteful, time consuming and costly. Offsite and prefabricated solutions go a long way in minimising

these

problems.

Container

structures - once the plan is designed - are prepared and fitted out in the workshop with time onsite as little as seven days to provide a fully weatherproof and watertight environment. The containers also offer a 100 per cent recycled solution - that’s zero construction waste. Like I said, living in a box has never seemed so sexy - or so sensible.

23 > 24

After languishing at the margins of federal policy for most of the past decade, passenger rail

HIGH SPEED TRAINS RETURN TO U.S. FAST TRACK

by Dave Demerjian

is moving to the fore as President Barack Obama joins a growing number of states in calling for heavy investment in America’s rail infrastructure.

After languishing at the margins of federal

speed future. He and others say bolstering

passenger rail is moving to the fore as

faster, cheaper and easier than building

policy for most of the past decade,

President Barack Obama joins a growing

number of states in calling for heavy investment in America’s rail infrastructure.

the nation’s passenger rail system is

more freeways or expanding an already overburdened air-travel system.

The president’s $825 billion economic

None of this surprises Michael Dukakis,

rail and mass transit projects; a Senate

advocate for mass transit and a national

stimulus package includes $30 billion for version specifically allocates $850 million for Amtrak and $2 billion for high-speed

rail. It’s significant, because Obama has long favored expanding passenger rail service and has specifically called for

a rail network linking Chicago with the major cities of the Midwest.

Some aren’t waiting for the feds to get with it. California voters recently

authorized the legislature to issue almost $10 billion in bonds to begin construction of an 800-mile high-speed rail line linking

San Francisco with Los Angeles. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has long argued

California must lead the nation to a high-

who for 30 years has been a leading

network of high-speed rail lines. The

former governor of Massachusetts and 1988 Democratic presidential candidate

believes “growth in rail is inevitable” and says everyone — from commuters to

automakers — stands to benefit from it, and it will only bolster the economy and help the environment.

IMPROVING SANITATION WITH THE PEEPOO BAG

by Matt Embrey

We have the technology to solve this problem, we have for ages, but the problem is that traditional wastewater treatment and sanitation systems are very expensive and difficult to install.

When I first saw the Peepoo bag I thought

We have the technology to solve this

realized it’s quite a novel idea. Basically

problem is that traditional wastewater

it was a joke, but after reading about it I it’s a plastic bag to go to the bathroom

in, which is why I thought it was a joke, but this simple little bag employs some sophisticated sustainable solutions and solves some pretty daunting problems.

In the developing world clean water and sanitation are very scarce. This is due to

over population and lack of infrastructure and poses a serious health risk to the affected populations.

In these parts

of the world not only do they lack the infrastructure to attain clean water, they

also lack the infrastructure needed to deal with all their waste, so they end up

contaminating the little water they have.

problem, we have for ages, but the treatment and sanitation systems are very expensive and difficult to install. That is where the Peepoo bag comes in. It is a very inexpensive and easily deployable.

The idea of using plastic bags to dispose

of waste isn’t a new idea. Quite common in the slums of Kenya, they are called

“Flying Toilets” because after they are used the bags are thrown out the window.

These are simple, cheaply made, plastic bags and don’t really remove the waste,

they just move it around. The Peepoo bag

is different because of several features that actually make it a sanitation system.

Around the world, one child dies every 15 seconds from to contaminated water.

For them the saying “Don’t piss where

you drink” isn’t a clever metaphor, it’s a real life challenge.

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