unit house? and coin lot by studio mid

[cteno4]

hs just announced studio mid may release of a little coin operated parking lot. as usual the first photos are pretty unrecognizable! looks like a small fenced lot with a checkout gate.

 

http://www.1999.co.jp/eng/10146734

 

also is something called a "unit house". not sure what this one is from the picture. perhaps little prefab mobile units? also looks like it has some other accessories, one which almost looks like a large dumpster! description is not much help, mentions integrated generator...

 

- Medium-sized generator integrated machine Sash (sim with painted windows) are included

 

http://www.1999.co.jp/eng/10146732

 

cheers

 

jeff

[bill937ca]

Translating unit house into Japanese and copying it into Google brings up images structures made from shipping containers or similar.

 

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=%E3%83%A6%E3%83%8B%E3%83%83%E3%83%88%E3%83%8F%E3%82%A6%E3%82%B9&um=1&ie=UTF-8&tbm=isch&source=og&sa=N&tab=wi&biw=1024&bih=554

 

Are these post-earthquake temporary structures?

[cteno4]

bill,

 

thanks good work. pretty much what i expected. this sort of stuff has been around for a long time as well as using old containers for storage, offices and even homes. figured these were this kind of thing for small temporary offices, storage, etc. we had that one thread on the hobbyshop in a container here a while back!

 

i expect stuff like this will be used a lot in the post earthquake-tsunami reconstruction period.

 

cheers

 

jeff

[David]

I don't think so, as some of your pictures show these are often 'ordinary' structures. There has been at least one hobby shop in Japan posted here that lived inside that type of structure. The thing about shipping containers (in particular the 40' "marine" containers) is that unless you have an exact trade balance in your industialized nation there are often a lot more coming in then going out (mainly China - > [your country]). I doubt there is much space in Japan to just toss the containers in a pile, nor do the Japanese tolerate that kind of waste. Northern European countries in the same situation have been looking at different uses for excess containers too.

[Guest ___]

Shipping container homes have become quite the rage in SEA and Japan over the past decade. Slowly some of the Scandinavian countries have been picking up the trend as well. It's a pretty effective form of recycling, and at the same time answers housing needs. by offering lo-income, hi-value homes to starving college grads. Young 20-something professionals are who SEA and Japan has been aiming these places at. There had been the idea of using them for the homeless in some of the lower valued properties as well, but the idea seems to have floundered, and now there's talk of this as a relief for disaster stricken areas.

 

http://weburbanist.com/2008/05/26/cargo-container-homes-and-offices/

[cteno4]

actually happening in the us as well. actually much of it is not so cheap, tends to be the trendies these days. i also remember hearing one big debate on code issues with these since they dont really fit how traditional buildings are made!

 

jeff

[bikkuri bahn]

The Japanese term "unit house" refers not to residential housing per se, but rather to prefabricated structures, mainly used for storage, as temporary offices on worksites, or as low cost retail structures or showrooms. I think the UK term for these structures is "portacabin".  There are larger residential structures using prefabricated components, but these are not called "unit houses".  As far as shipping containers, I have only seen them used as storage spaces, not for housing or office space.

[CaptOblivious]

The townships of South Africa---the unofficial towns the nation's poor have cobbled together (and the stage for movies as 'Tsotsi', which you simply must see and 'District 9') are largely built from scrap corrugated steel and discarded shipping containers.