Although we’ve had modular houses for a long time, somehow
the advantages never seem to make it into the political arena to any serious
extent. The wartime UK prefab
served its purpose and was discarded, although some have lasted for decades. My
aunt and uncle lived in one in Derby.
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Grade II listed Phoenix prefabs
Wake Green Road, BirminghamFrom Wikipedia |
Caravans for example. Modern caravans are produced on
factory production lines and a big one can cost as little as £20-30k.
Comfortable, easy to heat in winter and needing little maintenance, what’s not
to like about them? They can even be quite posh.
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| From leftbracket.com |
Caravans are easy to move of course, so if we all lived in them,
moving house would merely be a question of towing the thing from one plot to another.
Hook up the utilities and job done. If anyone needs more living
space I’m sure they could be designed to attach extra modules.
A big advantage is cost. Caravans are comparatively cheap, so the whole idea might highlight the
cost of each plot of land. Maybe we could simply rent plots from the local
authority, even making this the main tax base for the whole country.
Westminster wouldn’t like it, so that’s another benefit.
We’d get rid of a load of other taxes and pensioners would just tow their homes to a cheaper plot of land on retirement, leaving city life to younger
people with jobs and families.
The roof of the caravan could be an array of solar panels
and because caravans have batteries, they could even be reasonably effective in
a low-power caravan environment. In fact caravans with 12v lighting and gas
cylinders for cooking and heating might cope quite well with intermittent power
from wind turbines.
The practical stuff is easy enough for anyone to work out
for themselves, so why don’t such ideas find their way into the political
arena? After all, it's hardly a new or original notion.
Okay I know we aren't at all likely to go down this road. There are lots of reasons – there always are. Maybe the global warming brigade will push
it, but somehow I don’t think it is close to their middle class hearts.
7 comments:
Read this with great interest. There is another alternative too - a houseboat! Same length as the van, half the cost.
James - I've always quite fancied a houseboat. The trouble is I know nothing about boats.
When you see that 'pod' construction of buildings like hotels, can be undertaken in an enclosed, comfortable factory, it beats any other way to construct any sort of living quarters!
We were only discussing this yesterday, and have found that it is much cheaper to buy pods from China, than build the things here!
I couldn't agree more! When I was growing up I had many friends who lived in prefabs and they were great! I believe they were all finally torn down owing to their construction being close to 100% asbestos.
Park Homes are also worthy of consideration. This site, one of many, is well worth a brows - the interiors look pretty damn cool;
http://www.prestigeparkandleisurehomes.com/parkhomesforsale/parkhomesinyorkshire.htm
However, park homes seem to be for the 'over 50s' and not for families so why not use these modern, high spec. prefabs on new housing developments in our towns and cities? Almost instant, affordable, low maintenance quality housing. Could even be the answer for local authority housing.
Michael - we stayed in Ibis hotel recently - the bathroom was obviously a pod. Nothing wrong with it at all.
Mac - I don't know why local authorities don't build park homes. Maybe they do, but I'm sure more could be made of them.
How about these ones then:
http://www.huf-haus.com/en/home.html
Don't they count?
WY - yes they do count, but are they cheaper than traditional houses?
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