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Hold your stomach in! Mini-apartments may be one way to solve New York’s housing shortage.

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/22/realestate/micro-apartments-tiny-homes-prefabricated-in-brooklyn.html?_r=0#

 

 

B2 or not B2 – that a question? Sorry for the word play on the Bard’s work, but we could not resist…

The folks at ENR.com have posted an article by Nadine Post that we think accurately portrays the promise and the potential of Modular Construction WHEN ITS USED PROPERLY, and the downside when it is not.  Just like any construction technology, Modular must be implemented properly to achieve the reward of improved quality, reduced schedule and reduced cost.  We thank Nadine for an excellent article.

 

Issue: 09/15/2014

The Promise and Pitfalls of Modular Buildings

09/09/2014

By Nadine M. Post

Modular-building boosters, including traditional owners, developers, contractors and designers, maintain that off-site construction is faster, safer, leaner, greener, better quality and potentially less costly than site construction. But there is a big hitch, they caution: Building teams are not likely to reach modular delivery’s pot of gold unless they plan and execute the off-site strategy properly. And that is no simple proposition.

“Everyone thinks it’s a silver bullet,” says Jeffrey M. Brown, the developer and general contractor for the Stack, a mostly factory-built seven-story residential building in Upper Manhattan that opened in May. “It really isn’t unless you put the right ingredients in the bowl.”

Few know that better than developer Forest City Ratner Cos. (FCRC) and its team building the world’s future tallest modular tower: the 32-story B2 BKLYN residential building in Brooklyn, N.Y. Stalled at 10 stories, the B2 project at the $4.9-billion Pacific Park Brooklyn site, until recently called Atlantic Yards, is a glaring example of modular gone sour. The B2 project, designed by SHoP Architects, was going to take factory-built modular to the next level through the use of sophisticated digital tools to design, fabricate and manage assembly of the 930 modules.

Instead of a poster child for improved high-rise modular, B2 has become the poster child for modular run amok. Unable to solve their differences privately over delays and cost overruns, FCRC and Skanska USA Building Inc.—B2’s construction manager and FCRC’s partner in a new modular plant, called FC+Skanska Modular—are battling it out in court.

Despite the situation, both Skanska and FCRC say they are committed to factory-built modular. “We believe in modular as the future of the industry,” says Richard A. Kennedy, Skanska’s co-chief operating officer.

In a Sept. 4 letter to Kennedy, FCRC President and CEO MaryAnne Gilmartin says, “We remain resolute in modular technology’s potential and promise.”

Modular-building veterans are rattled by the B2 feud. “I’m angry because it gave this industry a black eye,” says Tom O’Hara, vice president for business development at Capsys Corp. The factory builder is supplying modules for a 65-unit residential building in the Bronx, N.Y., called 3361 Third Avenue.

Modular is of interest to traditional builders because, in part, it has been identified as a means for improving building production. Collaborative delivery and advances in digital tools for design, coordination, clash detection, project management and fabrication support the movement, as do advances in lifting equipment.

“This is not a new process, but there is newfound interest of late,” says Tom Hardiman, executive director of the Modular Building Institute (MBI).

Until 2009, the 31-year-old MBI had no traditional contractor members. Now, there are a dozen, including Gilbane Building Co., Mortenson Construction and PCL, but not Skanska or FCRC.

Off-site construction is most apppropriate for buildings with repetition, including schools, housing, hospitals, multifamily residential, hotels and dormitories. Many recent modular buildings are a mix of site-built, non-repetitive lower floors topped by assemblies.

The B2 drama is serving as a cautionary tale. The 85-member Off-Site Construction Council, formed last year by the National Institute of Building Sciences (NIBS) to advance all types of prefabrication and preassembly, “is interested in learning what works and what does not in all projects that pursue the use of off-site construction,” says Ryan Colker, the council’s director. “As the case unfolds, we will be looking to understand any role off-site construction had in the dispute.”

To the NIBS council, “off-site construction” is the design, fabrication and assembly of building elements at a location other than their installed location. “Off-site construction is characterized by an integrated planning and supply-chain optimization strategy,” says the council, in its draft off-site construction glossary.

Permanent modular construction, also known as volumetric or 3D modular, is a subset of off-site. NIBS defines it as “an innovative, sustainable construction delivery method utilizing off-site, lean manufacturing techniques to prefabricate single or multistory whole building solutions in deliverable module sections.” PMC buildings are made in a safe, controlled setting and can be framed in wood, steel or concrete. Modules can be delivered with mechanical-electrical-plumbing systems, fixtures and interior finishes.

“The application of manufacturing principles to design and construction enables us to put buildings together in more innovative ways,” says Sue Klawans, Gilbane’s director of operational excellence and planning and the council’s vice chair. “Why bring 2 million individual bricks, studs and wire connectors to the site? Let’s reduce that by a factor of 10 or 100.”

Off-site construction leaves “many owners, architects and builders confused and sometimes put off by the process,” says Ryan E. Smith, chairman of the NIBS council and director of the Integrated Technology in Architecture Center at the University of Utah. “It is not easy for those in their first rodeo.”

“Not easy” is an understatement for the first residential rodeo of FCRC and Skanska. Sited up against the two-year-old Barclays Center arena, B2 is already more than a year behind its original December completion date. On Aug. 27, Skanska stopped work at both the site and the FC+Skanska Modular plant, furloughing more than 150 workers and raising the ire of Forest City. Lawsuits have followed.

Skanska is asking for more than $50 million in damages over its $117-million fixed-price contract to cover alleged “commercial and design issues.” Forest City, on a campaign to reopen the plant, alleges Skanska has breached its contract after “multiple failures and missteps” that led to “massive delays and cost overruns.”

John Erb, vice president of sales and marketing for Deluxe Building Systems Inc., says, “If a project goes awry, it means the team didn’t know the process. It’s like me trying to perform open-heart surgery tomorrow without any training.” Deluxe supplied modules for the 90.5-ft-tall Stack, the U.S. record-holder for the tallest completed modular building.

Factory modular is “a science” and “outsiders” should not venture into the business, which is drastically different from traditional site construction, says Capsys’ O’Hara.

There are flaws in the B2 scheme, say those experienced with modular, especially the “still” construction plan developed by XSite Modular—Forest City’s modular-business partner-consultant before Skanska. Unlike an assembly line, still construction is built in place by teams, each assigned to a vertical line of identical units. The approach and the 913 unique modules do not take advantage of the efficiencies of assembly-line production, say modular experts.

O’Hara also maintains that the B2 modules, which include facade panels, are too complete. Most modules don’t include the panels because they often cause alignment problems during field fit-up.

FCRC and Skanska declined to comment on the criticism of their approach.

Modular delivery disrupts the economics, workflow, contracts, coordination points, insurance and building regulations of conventional site-built projects. There can be issues with the union building trades. Off-site delivery raises questions even about warranties versus bonding. Is a bathroom pod a product or not?

Plan review also must be completed early, but most buildings departments are not geared up for this.

Transportation, picking, setting, tolerances, on-site stitching and detailing are different from site construction. “I have tremendous respect for logistics, which can make or break a project,” says the Stack’s Brown. “Transportation is a big piece of the cost.”

Global Building Modules—with FXFowle Architects as architect, LERA as structural engineer and Dagher Engineering as mechanical engineer—is trying to market a patented modular system that would solve some of the transportation issues. The concept calls for steel-framed modules that are dimensionally the same as shipping containers; the modules could be produced in port areas of cheap labor and shipped by sea and rail to sites.

So far, there have been no takers. “Everyone is always blown away by how technically resolved the idea is, but each asks, ‘Who has done a building?’ ” says David Wallance, a senior associate at FXFowle.

Project Frog has demonstrated a way around flat-bed-truck limitations for 3D modules. The company supplies kits of parts to the site; only bathroom pods are 3D. “Flat-pack construction is affordable to ship,” says Ann Hand, Project Frog’s president and CEO.

Modular delivery relies on owner buy-in and early team collaboration. With 3D modular, there is no fast-tracking, but there is resequencing. Design decisions have to be finalized up front, to allow prospective modular builders to price the job and the winner to order supplies.

“Bathroom finish colors and tile patterns are not typically set during the foundation-document phase,” says Maja Rosenquist, project director with Mortenson Construction for the $623-million Exempla Saint Joseph Hospital, which has off-site-built elements and is nearing completion in Denver.

The early decisions for the Bronx project “put enormous pressure on us,” says James McCullar. His eponymous firm is the architect for the 64-module project.

It’s best to test the waters of modular in stages. Gilbane started with preassembled multitrade utility racks on a U.S. project. Then, it added vertical risers to the next job: the 270,000-sq-ft Global Technical & Innovation Center in Kerry, Ireland. The various prefabricated components sliced three months off the laboratory’s schedule, says Gilbane. “The modular nature, developed in the [building information model], allowed us to run a number of layout and cost scenarios early,” says Ian Howard, project manager for the client, the Kerry Group. “That gives us a high degree of confidence.”

Discounting glitches with the buildings department that caused a three-month delay, the Stack would have taken two-thirds the time of site construction, says Peter Gluck, of Gluck+, the Stack’s architect design-builder.

Mortenson commissioned the University of Colorado, Boulder, to do a study on its 831,000-sq-ft Denver project to compare it to site construction. The study concluded that the prefab approach for utility racks, bathroom pods, exterior panels and head walls reduced the schedule by 72 work days. The job used 29,500 fewer hours of labor, resulting in $2.6 million in productivity savings, and diverted 150,000 hours of labor off-site. There was $4.3 million in indirect cost savings, but direct costs were 6% more than site construction, according to the study.

“Certain elements were more expensive until the indirect costs were accounted for,” thanks to the fear factor in the pricing, says Bill Gregor, Mortenson’s construction executive for the hospital.

Mortenson holds a prefab charrette to determine the off-site path for a project. Another important step is a full-scale prototype to avoid repeating a mistake hundreds of times.

Some say design-build is the best delivery system for modular, but any collaborative approach will work. Architect James B. Guthrie, president of Miletus Group Inc., a modular design-build firm, has doubts about modular becoming mainstream any time soon. Until there is a better knowledge base and a better supply chain, “modular won’t become widespread,” he says.

The NIBS council was formed to fill the knowledge gap and gather metrics to prove the case, especially to reluctant owners. “We’ve recognized it’s a challenge to capture some of the potential efficiencies,” says Colker.

To help foster off-site, the council recently posted two online surveys. The deadline for responses is Oct. 15.

The industry survey, available online here, is intended to identify the opportunities and challenges associated with the use of off-site construction processes and technologies.

The academic survey, available online here, will determine the scope of off-site construction teaching and research in U.S. colleges and universities. Results will be used to support the development of tools and resources for the schools.

The council also is seeking $150,000 for an off-site construction implementation guide, to help demystify the process.

Demystification is already under way in the U.K., home to the world’s tallest completed modular tower: a 24-story dorm at the University of Wolverhampton. The 10-year-old industry group Buildoffsite has published hundreds of case studies that detail the benefits of off-site solutions. They are available at www.buildoffsite.com.

Pitfalls aside, mainstream builders’ move toward modular delivery is a logical step in one of biggest transformations in the construction industry since the introduction of the combustion engine and electric power, says Gilbane’s Klawans.

“We’re in the midst of creative destruction and reinvention of our industry,” says Klawans. “It’s exciting.”

A modular building project in the Bronx is moving along, with four of its 64 total modules added each day.

Third Ave, Bronx

http://enr.construction.com/business_management/project_delivery/2014/0915-The-Promise-and-Pitfalls-of-Modular-Buildings.asp

More Nehemiah Spring Creek Homes Are On The Way

We are currently finishing up the first grouping of homes for the next phase of Nehemiah’s Spring Creek project.  The attached is an informative piece describing the continuing Spring Creek housing project as it appears at the website of the Project Architect Alexander Gorlin.

http://gorlinarchitects.com/projects/nehemiah-spring-creek

MyMicro NY, our modular, micro-apartment tower coming to Manhattan later this year

M&T Bank Finances Manhattan’s First Micro-Unit Development

BY DAMIAN GHIGLIOTTY 4/02 12:54PM

It was a tight deal for an even tighter development. M&T Bank recently closed a $10.3 million construction loan for the creation of Manhattan’s first micro-unit rental property to be built in Kips Bay. The loan went to Brooklyn-based Monadnock Construction, which is leading the project’s development team, Mortgage Observer has first learned.

The nine-story “My Micro NY” project, located on the northeast corner of East 27th Street and Mt. Carmel Place, will consist of 55 prefabricated apartments averaging about 300 square feet with 40 percent of the units being offered at below market rates. The mini apartments will contain nearly 10-foot ceilings and seven-foot-wide balconies in addition to 16-foot-long overhead loft spaces and full closets.

My Micro NY RenderingMy Micro NY Rendering

“Modular construction is cost efficient and we believe these micro-units will fill a need in the Manhattan market,” said M&T Regional President Peter D’Arcy. “As one of New York City’s more experienced commercial real estate lenders, we’ve thoroughly reviewed the business case for this project and are very comfortable providing the financial support.” M&T declined to discuss the term and rate of the construction loan, which closed in March.

Monadnock and its partners, the Actors Fund Housing Development Corporation and New York-based architecture firm nARCHITECTS, won a competition to build the city’s first micro-units in early 2013. Installation of the 55 units, prefabricated by Capsys Corporation at the Brooklyn Navy Yard, began earlier this year. The micro-units, being installed on the site of an old surface parking lot near Bellevue Park South, are expected to be available for rent in 2015. The ground floor of the completed property will contain 678 square feet of retail space.

Additional financing for the $16.6 million project will come through equity provided by the project’s developers and a secondary loan from the New York City Department of Housing Preservation and Development.

“It’s exciting to pioneer this new housing type in association with the City and our partners, including M&T,” said Nicholas Lembo, Monadnock’s president. “It’s an ideal application for modular construction, and we’re proud to use this innovative approach to offer another affordable option to New Yorkers looking for housing that fits their lifestyles.”

 

M&T Bank Finances Manhattan’s First Micro-Unit Development

Happy Thanksgiving!

 

Have a Happy Thanksgiving! Hoping your Thanksgiving is filled with blessings and joy.

Happy Thanksgiving

 

City Council Tour

On a fact-finding tour of Capsys, members of the city council learn about modular construction in New York City at Capsys, the only modular manufacturer operating in New York City.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Pictured are:

Elizabeth Crowley, Councilmember

Nick Lembo, President of Capsys Corp.

Erik Martin Dilan, Councilmember

Tom O’Hara, Business Development at Capsys Corp.

Gale A. Brewer, Councilmember

Jumaane D. Williams, Councilmember

 

Three Story Building Erected in Just One Day!

The Linwood Street building, which is one out of three buildings of our Cypress Village project, was erected in just one day!  Joined by the owner and architect plus the local neighborhood residents, I watched in amazement as the building was set in place so quickly. This is just another example of the many important benefits of modular construction.

 

Very Exciting News from Mayor Bloomberg!

 

www.nyc.gov

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
PR- 032-13
January 22, 2013

MAYOR BLOOMBERG ANNOUNCES WINNER OF adAPT NYCCOMPETITION TO DEVELOP INNOVATIVE MICRO-UNIT APARTMENT HOUSING MODEL

Monadnock Development, Actors Fund Housing Development Corporation, and nARCHITECTS Will Build City’s First Micro-Unit Apartment Building Using Innovative Design and Modular Construction

40 Percent of 55 New Units in ‘My Micro NY’ at 335 East 27th Street Will be Available to Low- and Middle-Income New Yorkers

Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg, Deputy Mayor for Economic Development Robert K. Steel and Department of Housing Preservation and Development Commissioner Mathew M. Wambua announced today that the winner of the adAPT NYC Competition is a development team composed of Monadnock Development LLC, Actors Fund Housing Development Corporation, and nARCHITECTS. The development team was chosen through a competitive Request for Proposals to design, construct and operate the city’s first micro-unit apartment building on a City-owned site at 335 East 27th Street in Manhattan. The development team’s ‘My Micro NY’ project will create 55 new micro-units, 40 percent of which will be affordable beyond the competitive market rents, that are designed to optimize space and maximize the sense of openness. ‘My Micro NY’ will be the first multi-unit building in Manhattan developed using modular construction, with the modules prefabricated locally by Capsys at the Brooklyn Navy Yard. The Mayor made the announcement at the Museum of the City of New York and was joined by Monadnock Development president Nicholas Lembo, Actors Fund Housing Development Corporation president Scott Weiner and nARCHITECTS principal Eric Bunge.

“New York’s ability to adapt with changing times is what made us the world’s greatest city – and it’s going to be what keeps us strong in the 21st Century,” said Mayor Bloomberg. “The growth rate for one- and two-person households greatly exceeds that of households with three or more people, and addressing that housing challenge requires us to think creatively and beyond our current regulations.”

adAPT NYC is a pilot program that was launched in July 2012 through a Request for Proposals to develop a new model of housing – micro-units. The proposals were evaluated on several criteria, including innovative micro-unit layout and building design. The ‘My Micro NY’ proposal excelled in this category, with features like generous 9’-10” floor-to-ceiling heights and Juliette balconies that provide substantial access to light and air. The micro-units developed as part of this pilot will measure between 250 and 370 square feet.

“Mayor Bloomberg is committed to expanding the housing options available to New Yorkers, and with the results of the adAPT project we’ve clearly seen that developers believe there is a robust market for smaller apartment sizes,” said Deputy Mayor for Economic Development Robert K. Steel. “Today’s announcement is a milestone for new housing models.”

“The remarkable number of high-quality responses to the adAPT NYC RFP validates the position that developing micro-unit living is both financially and physically feasible in the New York City landscape,” said HPD Commissioner Mathew M. Wambua. “Monadnock, nARCHITECTS and the Actors Fund HDC came through with an inventive and striking interpretation of the micro-unit concept. The team’s ‘My Micro NY’ proposal is reflective of our objectives and signifies tremendous promise for this housing model. Remarkable things can be accomplished when thinking carefully about how people live and how we can program small spaces to integrate individuals’ lifestyles with common, or shared, space. This is the result when government acts as a catalyst for private sector innovation.”

“The Monadnock proposal is compelling because it clearly demonstrates how careful planning and design innovation can transform a building into a community and a small unit into a home”, said Planning Commissioner Burden. “The adAPT RFP fulfills its promise by providing a tangible new housing option, which has the potential to broaden housing choices for New Yorkers.”

“Our buildings should be built to meet the needs of New Yorkers, and as our population continues to grow and evolve, so must our housing stock,” said Commissioner LiMandri. “The Monadnock proposal is a fresh, innovative design that recognizes the changes in how we live as a society and presents a safe, reasonable housing option for those who want to call New York City home.”

Designed by nARCHITECTS, ‘My Micro NY’ is an elegant building distinguished by the creative use of setbacks and subtle changes in the color of the brick cladding. A multi-purpose and transparently-glazed space on the ground floor will be programed for rehearsals, performances, lectures and other creative activities, in addition to a café. Inside, the efficient apartment design includes ample storage, such as a 16’-long overhead loft space and a full-depth closet. Compact kitchens contain a full-height pull-out pantry, a full-height fridge, range, and space for a convection microwave. The property will include amenities that invite resident interaction, such as an attic garden, a ground-floor porch with picnic tables, den areas, and a multi-purpose lounge. Programmed interior space comprises 18 percent of the building’s gross square footage. The building will also have a laundry room, residential storage, a bike room, and fitness space.

While the variation in unit sizes and configuration is efficiently limited, minor shifts in the building’s volume, and changes in orientation of units, and location and type of windows generate spatial diversity.  Each unit is comprised of two distinct zones: a ‘toolbox’ containing a kitchen, bathroom and storage  and a ‘canvas’ providing ample, well-proportioned flexible space allowing for individual expression, and serving as the primary living and sleeping area. ‘My Micro NY’ unites a spectrum of scales ranging from efficiently designed kitchens to the organization of the apartments and common space, all in a simple yet iconic building.

The property will include common spaces with amenities which also emphasize a creative use of space, including a rooftop garden, shared lounge areas on nearly every floor to invite resident interaction, and an 8th floor deck for socializing or group fitness activities that has an additional multi-purpose lounge that can seat twenty for dinner or up to forty for a standing room event. The ‘My Micro NY’ building will also have a laundry room, a storage room, a bike room, and a fitness room.

Highly-skilled workers will prefabricate the building modules at Capsys’s indoor facility in the Brooklyn Navy Yard. Capsys is the first NYC-approved manufacturer of prefabricated modules. After site work, foundations, utilities, and the construction of the ground floor is completed using traditional methods, the modules would arrive on the site with fixtures and finishes already installed. The modules would be hoisted into place in approximately two weeks and the brick facades would be built on the development site. Residents are expected to move in by September 2015.

“We are grateful to the City and the Department of Housing Preservation and Development for selecting our proposal from such a competitive pool,” said Alphonse Lembo of Monadnock. “We’ve built market-rate and affordable housing in the five boroughs that have given people places to live and make memories, but this is an important opportunity to change the way we think about living space in an urban setting.”

“We are proud to be a member of the development team selected by the Department of Housing Preservation and Development to be at the vanguard of implementing Mayor Bloomberg’s vision to provide a new and innovative option for attractive affordable housing that responds to the changing demographics and preferences of New York City’s residents,” said Scott Weiner, President of the Actors Fund Housing Development Corporation.

“We’re thrilled at the chance of designing a housing prototype that will give New Yorkers in small spaces a sense of living in a larger social fabric” said Eric Bunge, Principal of nARCHITECTS.

The ‘My Micro NY’ building will provide housing to one- and two-person households across a variety of incomes. Twenty percent of the apartments (eleven units) will be reserved for households with incomes not exceeding 80 percent of the Area Median Income (AMI); nine percent (5 units) will be reserved for households with incomes not exceeding 145 percent of AMI; and eleven percent (6 units) will be reserved for households with incomes not exceeding 155 percent of AMI. The remainder of the units will be market rate, along with one superintendent’s unit. The development team was able to achieve affordability in the micro-units for low- and middle-income households without utilizing any direct City subsidy or financing, in part through its use of the modular design, which can significantly reduce a project schedule, resulting in savings on financing and conventional construction costs.

While reviewing the proposals, the City consulted with members of the adAPT NYC Advisory Board, which was created last year. The Board is composed of 12 leaders in architecture and design, housing, and economic development and was assembled to provide feedback on top proposals. Committee members include:

  • Barry Bergdoll, Chief Curator of Architecture & Design, Museum of Modern Art
  • Rafael Cestero, President and CEO, Community Preservation Corporation
  • Tom Eich, Partner, IDEO
  • Paul Goldberger, Contributing Editor, Vanity Fair
  • Toni Griffin, Professor of Architecture and Director, J. Max Bond Center at City College of New York
  • Robert Hammond, Co-Founder and Executive Director, Friends of the High Line
  • Bjarke Ingels, Architect and Founding Partner, BIG-Bjarke Ingels Group
  • Janel Laban, Executive Editor, Apartment Therapy
  • Maya Lin, Artist, Maya Lin Studio
  • Richard Plunz, Director of the Urban Design Program, Columbia University’s Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation
  • Robert Selsam, Senior Vice President, Boston Properties
  • Christian Siriano, Fashion Designer, Christian Siriano

The winning proposal and four other notable proposals will be featured in an upcoming exhibit at the Museum of the City of New York called Making Room: New Models for Housing New Yorkers. The exhibit, which is co-presented by the Museum and the Citizens Housing & Planning Council, features creative ideas for how to accommodate the changing demographics of New York City’s population.

“With this exhibition, the Museum of the City of New York and the Citizens Housing & Planning Council are giving New Yorkers a glimpse into the future of housing in our city,” said Susan Henshaw Jones, Ronay Menschel Director of the Museum of the City of New York. “We are excited to showcase proposals from the adAPT NYCCompetition and to foster a discussion of solutions to the city’s emerging housing needs.”

The adAPT NYC Competition was created to introduce additional choices within New York City’s housing market to accommodate the city’s growing population of one- and two-person households. Currently New York City has 1.8 million one- and two-person households, but only one million studios and one-bedrooms. The City’s housing codes have not kept up with its changing population, and currently do not allow an entire building of micro-units. Under this pilot program, Mayor Bloomberg will waive certain zoning regulations at a City-owned site at 335 East 27th Street to test the market for this new housing model. The adAPT NYC RFP was downloaded more than 1,600 times in hundreds of cities domestically and abroad, and generated 33 proposals by the submission deadline – making this the largest response received by HPD for a housing project. It is expected that the project will complete the Uniform Land Use Review Procedure for disposition of City-owned land in the fall and break ground on construction at the end of 2013.

The adAPT NYC initiative is part of Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg’s New Housing Marketplace Plan. The New Housing Marketplace Plan is a multi-billion dollar initiative to finance 165,000 units of affordable housing for half a million New Yorkers by the close of Fiscal Year 2014. To date, every dollar invested by the City, the Plan has leveraged $3.42 in private funding for a total commitment of more than $20 billion to fund the creation or preservation of over 140,920 units of affordable housing across the five boroughs.

http://www.nyc.gov/portal/site/nycgov/menuitem.c0935b9a57bb4ef3daf2f1c701c789a0/index.jsp?pageID=mayor_press_release&catID=1194&doc_name=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.nyc.gov%2Fhtml%2Fom%2Fhtml%2F2013a%2Fpr032-13.html&cc=unused1978&rc=1194&ndi=1

Happy New Year!

    Capsys team joins in sending warmest thoughts and best wishes

    for a wonderful and a very Happy New Year!

 

NY1 about Modular Construction

 

By: Monica Brown

Modular construction may soon catch on in the city, but a Brooklyn factory has been building homes, floor to ceiling, for 16 years. NY1’s Monica Brown filed the following report.

 

Modular construction can have a house almost entirely built in a factory. The pieces are brought on trucks to their final destination, and the finishing touches can be done on-site. This method could mean big cost savings for the Big Apple, where experts say construction costs are skyrocketing.

“Housing is becoming out of reach for too many New Yorkers,” says New York Building Congress President Richard Anderson. “And if this could bring down the cost somewhat, then a significant sector of the New York City population might have a chance to buy or to rent an apartment.”

In Fort Greene, Brooklyn, Capsys Corp. has been building modular homes for 16 years in the Brooklyn Navy Yard. Its affordable housing units, assisted living facilities, hotels and more other buildings are dropped off at sites in all five boroughs and beyond.

Company officials say the average savings can be 5 to 20 percent with modular construction, and that business has been picking up a lot in the last several years.

“Some of that is because we’re coming out of the recession and we’re seeing more activity, but a lot of is it really is just catching on. We like to say that we’re the oldest brand-new idea in construction,” says Tom O’Hara, the director of marketing at Capsys.

Forest City Ratner Corporation might also be trying to change minds. It announced last year that it may look to build the world’s largest modular tower at Atlantic Yards in Brooklyn. The company declined to be interviewed for this story.

But New York Building Congress officials tell NY1 that project, and other modulars like it, might go a long way toward helping to keep New York’s building industry competitive.

“Innovation in the construction industry is always important because we’re the highest cost construction market in the country, and we are encouraging our members to look for ways to economize, to look to do things differently, and in a better way,” says Anderson.

http://www.ny1.com/content/ny1_living/real_estate/170975/bit-by-bit–builders-come-to-appreciate-modular-construction