HOUSING
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California Veteran's Resource Book 2014
Federal Benefits for Veterans 2014
VA Project CHALENG –
Identifying and Meeting the Needs of Homeless Veterans
H4VF Flyer
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You gave some, some gave All--the last measure of devotion--and you who remain with us deserve only the Respect and Appreciation of our Nation.
If you have no home -- you have no stability.
Thousands of Veterans in America are homeless.
Recycling in Support of the Homes4Vets Foundation
"If you value your Freedom...
Thank a Vet!"
In a Report from the California Department of Housing & Community Development, Division of Housing Policy Development,
The State of Housing in California 2012
(pdf), it states:
"Affordability Worsens, Supply Problems Remain"
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H4VF in cooperation with
Container Building Systems
intends on building and proofing a series of housing projects specifically planned for serving the needs of our homeless veterans and those of their immediate families. These projects will include single-family and multi-family developments. These projects will utilize used shipping containers as construction costs which are typically 40% lower than with conventional site construction. Operational costs, in terms of energy usage, will also be significantly lower as the latest solar power systems technologies will be utilized.
When 250,000 homes were destroyed during Hurricane Katrina, FEMA provided trailer homes. Nine years later a lot of those people are still living in them. That was a national disaster. The homeless situation--especially for our Veterans--must also be treated as a disaster!
Shipping containers when rehabilitated for human habitation includes flooring, drywall, electrical outlets, windows and doorways. A forty-foot container could house 2 people. Our military have used shipping containers for many years to house our soldiers and conduct operations here and in far-flung regions of the world. Most if not all emergency and disaster housing has been utilizing shipping containers. Many 'off-grid' homes have been built with shipping containers. Countries in Europe have utilized shipping containers for many housing projects and customized home designs for years. But, we here in the USA have not been seriously exploring the potentials of shipping containers serving as human habitat because we have been blessed with abundant resources and land.
Why Use A Shipping Container?
Piling up in every port... More and more... Higher and higher...
Due to trade deficits, which are causing much more freight to enter our country than to be shipped out, an estimated 1 million shipping containers are sitting around unused. Strict DOT regulations in mandating the durability and increased lifespan of shipping containers is also increasing the inventory of used shipping containers from around the world. This surplus is especially profound in the United States. The issue with these containers is that they usually sit empty, they are not cost-effective to ship back 'empty' to their points of origin, and they are piling up. Many are stored in container storage yards where they are stacked up to 8 stories high, resembling 'abandoned cities', often overwhelming the landscape of the communities in which they reside. This is a major growing problem--but it also presents an OPPORTUNITY in which we can help not only to alleviate this problem, but at the same time solve another pressing national problem by repurposing these containers for use as housing for the homeless.
In the United States, the importation of goods and services is nearly 60 percent higher than exportation. This influx
Shipping containers are used to transport goods all over the world. It is estimated that 90 percent of the world's trade goods are moved in containers. One hundred million container loads crisscross the world's oceans each year in over 5,000 container ships. There is a very big chance that a lot of the stuff you own or buy came to you in a shipping container. But these shipping containers create problems too. After they are used a few times, they become used shipping containers and nobody wants them. These containers currently have no real use since it is not cost effective to return empty containers to their point of origin. Since it’s cheaper to manufacture new shipping containers on the opposite side of the ocean than to transport the empty ones back, the shipping container industry continues to produce more of them each and every year. You might say that shipping containers are a renewable resource of sorts.
But unlike wood, or other sustainable resources, shipping containers do not "grow" benignly. They are not harmless in their effect on the environment. In fact, they are stacked, dozens of containers high, in port cities and areas around inland freight transit terminals. In some residential neighborhoods, these mountainous stacks of hundreds of thousands of empty shipping containers actually cast a shadow causing the sun to "set" an hour earlier than in the surrounding area! So, they are already impacting the lifestyle of some coastal residents.
Besides being an aesthetic nightmare, these shipping containers pose a serious waste disposal problem. Unless something is done, the environmental impact will only worsen. Twenty-one thousand containers hit American shores every day of the year, and tens of thousands reach the waterfronts of other countries, with many more at sea on any given day. This method of transporting goods is unlikely to change. As long as we are trading with Asia, there is going to be a glut of shipping containers. We can’t change this situation. What can change is how we look at it.
Rather than looking at these shipping containers as a waste disposal problem, we can choose to regard them as an abundance of potential building material. Shipping containers are readily available across the globe. So there is a bright spot in this darkening sky. Some architects and builders are beginning to take advantage of this surplus to recycle the containers. This then, is the first degree of reparation: to clean up the coastlines by recycling these used shipping containers. Recycling in this way will result in cleaner and healthier coastlines without creating another problem like huge areas of landfill.
Source: 'The History of the Shipping Containers'
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The trade imbalance between US and mainly China is bringing more shipping containers to U.S. ports.
The Benefits of Building with Shipping Containers
BACKGROUND:
of imported goods creates what is known as a trade deficit. America is buying so much merchandise from other
countries, primarily China, and selling so little back to them that shipping containers are an impending waste
disposal problem and a potential environmental hazard.
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