In response to Boston’s Mayor Marty Walsh’s goal of adding 53,000 affordable housing units in the next 15 years, in order to keep up with a growing population, Boston Globe’s Mike Ross suggests modular construction techniques.

A team of local studio architects called studioMAUD proposes Boston build its own modular production facility to save time and money, instead of importing prefab units from Pennsylvania or the Brooklyn Navy Yards. Not just spouting theory, the two couples who founded MAUD share a two bedroom apartment.

As Ross tells MHProNews, with the possibility of Boston landing the Olympics in 2024, a modular housing facility would fit right in. Cambridge architect Kyu Sung Woo, who worked on the 1988 Summer Games in Seoul, constructed 5,500 housing units in 18 months, including three schools and a community center.

David Manfredi, the architect for Boston’s Olympic bid, envisions re-purposing buildings used during the games for housing, and is relying on engineers and housing experts from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and the Harvard Graduate School of Design for assistance in the planning. ##

(Photo credit: shutterstock–modular housing being sited)

  Article submitted by Matthew J. Silver to Daily Business News-MHProNews.