These modular frames are built down south and shipped up to
the factory on flatbed trucks. They wait outside until they're ready to be
outfitted inside. The metal frame actually forms the support skeleton of the
building when all the pieces go together.(Jake Dobkin)
The first step in the assembly line: adding the interior
framing for walls and sheetrock.(Jake Dobkin)
You can see the interior stairs for the building in this
module.(Jake Dobkin)
Heavy parts are brought in using a crane. Having the modules
on the floor means that jobs usually done high in the air on a regular building
site can be done easier and with less risk of injury.(Jake Dobkin)
The metal frames for walls are made at this station, then
sent across the factory floor to be installed in modules.(Jake Dobkin)
The factory is pretty warm inside: beats working outdoors on
a construction site in winter.(Jake Dobkin)
One of the triangular corner modules that will face Flatbush
Avenue. There are a couple of dozen different shapes of module- they go
together in groups to form a single apartment.(Jake Dobkin)
Fitting out the inside of another module. These workers are
assigned to a cross-functional team that does a bunch of tasks, including
drywall, pipes, windows, etc.(Jake Dobkin)
Parts are stored nearby for when they're needed. It's easier
to get them where they need to go than on a vertical skyscraper site.(Jake
Dobkin)
These workers are unionized construction workers fitting out
the bathroom boxes, which are installed as one piece in the other modules,
complete with tub, sink, and shower rods.(Jake Dobkin)
These modules are almost ready for shipping to the job site
at Atlantic Yards; you can see the shiny black exterior panels which will form
part of the wall of the skyscraper.(Jake Dobkin)
The warehouse is huge. More than a hundred construction
workers are moving around inside.(Jake Dobkin)
The breakroom for lunch, a step up from eating on the
sidewalk.(Jake Dobkin)
Critics of Atlantic Yards have been sharpening their
pitchforks since Barclays Center opened its sleek polished doors last
September, demanding to know what became of all that affordable housing Bruce
Ratner promised so many moons ago. The answer, it turns out, lies deep in a
warehouse in the Brooklyn Navy Yard. It took eons longer than many would have
preferred, but it's in there.
Modular housing is nothing new. The reigning tallest
building—a 24-story dormitory located in Wolverhampton, England—was finished in
2009. But the Atlantic Yards apartments, which will be rented at 50 percent
market rate, 30 percent middle and moderate income and 20 percent low income,
will contain a record-breaking 363 units and top out at 32 floors. All 102
workers—soon to be 125—are union. The building, called "B2" (the
first of 15), will feature all the amenities Brooklynites have come to expect
from their freshly constructed high-rises: A 24-hour doorman, a fitness center,
a lounge, game room, a yoga studio, roof terrace and a washer and dryer in
every unit. But it's not the amenities that make modular buildings unique—it's
their construction.
Forest City reps compare modular housing to an assembly
line, though construction, they say, is more akin to building an airplane
engine than a car. Workers are "cross-trained," meaning that instead
of focusing on one rote task, a team of eight to ten build entire components of
the modules, of which there are 25 configurations. Apartments are composed of
several modules bound together—a one-bedroom, for instance, might consist of
two or three.
The modules begin with a steel frame, carted to Brooklyn in
loads from Virginia. From there, workers spend around 10 days assembling its
interior. Modular units are all inclusive in that everything, down to
appliances and even towel racks, are installed in the warehouse, at which point
they will simply be brought two miles down the road to their final Dean Street
location, and stacked on top of each other using a bracing configuration
standard among high-rises.
Because each unit is free-standing until snapped into place,
the "mods," as they're called, are said to be more soundproof than
the typical apartment building because neighbors don't share any walls. It's appealing
to think of sliding one's apartment out of the building, like a hollow Jenga
block, setting it on wheels and driving it straight out of the city.
People sometimes get the idea that modular housing looks
cheap, said Gregg Pasquarelli, of SHoP architects, which co-designed the units.
But dwelling on the building's prefab construction misses the point. "You
can make a Hyundai on an assembly line, you can make a Rolls Royce on an
assembly line," he said, adding that in those terms, B2 would be the equivalent
of "a super nice Volkswagen, or an entry level Audi."
"This isn’t $4,000 a foot stuff on 57th Street, but I
think that’s good," he said. "There's nothing inherent about modular
that needs to be low-quality."
Despite employing all-union workers, the project is
nevertheless facing a lawsuit from the Plumbing Foundation, since licensed
plumbers are not being used in the Navy Yard warehouse. The nature of the
modular design, however, means that there is no plumbing or electrical systems
being attached at the factory—all of that is packaged with the structures and
done on-site.
As of now, the units are around 10 percent cheaper than
their conventional counterparts, though Melissa Burch, Forest City's Director
of Commercial & Residential Development, anticipates savings of up to 30
percent as the technique is perfected.
"Frank Lloyd Wright, Buckminster Fuller—all of these
people for years have been kind of thinking and dreaming and playing around
with modular," she said. "It has captured the imagination of a lot of
different types of people."
So why, considering its advantages, is Forest City the first
to innovate the modular technology? Atlantic Yards' steep low-income housing
requirement has something to do with it.
"No one builds affordable housing in high rise, and no
one does affordable housing, high rise and union," she said. "And in
order to make that trio of issues kind of work out, we’ve got to change the
game somehow."
"Necessity is the mother of invention," she added.
"We had a business challenge to solve."
If all goes as planned, the stacking of the mods will
commence next week, so keep an eye out for entire apartment units being snapped
into place.
Source: Gothamist.com
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