New 14x34 foot veterans center office. Now 36 foot

[steve ramsey]

I'm sure you've thought of this, make sure the covered walkway isn't attached to the buildings so it can not be considered 1 structure.

 

[John Bartley]

I know this topic is a bit stale, but ..... I'm doing some renovating of my own up here and one of the "options" I have for creating space is a couple of twenty foot long cargo containers (aka: sea cans). These, if able to be moved are classified as "temporary" in every sense of the word, are lockable, weather tight and transportable on your average tilt-n-load. A twenty footer is 160 sqft. (20x8 foot print)

Any reason why you couldn't put in a pair of these ..... say about 10-15 feet apart, build a shallow pitched truss, tin-clad roof to cover both containers and the space, but make the roof in say ... four parts so that an average excavator could lift it off in sections if necessary, and then put a deck under the open air covering?
Build your offices inside, with quick-disconnect power cabling and put a front door just inside each container door so that at night you swing the container doors closed and drop in a padlock.

Anyway ... I was just daydreaming about this recently so I thought I'd share my idea for "temporary" under 200 sqft per unit.

cheers

 

[Don Baer]

Any reason why you couldn't put in a pair of these ..... say about 10-15 feet apart

John we looked at that but from a cost stand point there is no advantage and from an aesthetics stand point they lack a lot. The concept we came up with allows us to have the ability to move them at a late date just like the container but they will look like they were built as offices not cargo containers. and 8 foot container makes a very narrow office.

BTW this is not a stale thread just been on hold. The people who gave us the grant (the Ak-Chin Indians) have to approve the new design and like some are fond of saying "tonight's the Night" the tribal council meets tonight to approve the changes. So hopefully this is the last hurdle on getting this project started. I am hoping to place the order for the structures next week.

 

[Ryan Mooney]

one of the "options" I have for creating space is a couple of twenty foot long cargo containers (aka: sea cans).

Be aware that a lot of these have floor treatment using, interior treatment/paint made from, or carried chemicals that are very much in Not Good catagory (there are reasonable reasons for this considering their use case and travel conditions.. it's just not something you'd want to.. live in..). They're super useful for storage or other uninhabited spaces but after reading some more about them I'd be real cautious about using one as an office space or a workshop area. Some folks have addressed this fairly successfully with encapsulation (basically use Really Good Paint to lock in the icky stuff).

The "portable office" type setups Don's looking at are generally more habitable out of the box so to speak... If you're in a fire zone do pay a bit of attention to sealing/skirting the underside as I know people who've lost them to a stray ember...

 

[John Bartley]

John we looked at that but from a cost stand point there is no advantage and from an aesthetics stand point they lack a lot. The concept we came up with allows us to have the ability to move them at a late date just like the container but they will look like they were built as offices not cargo containers. and 8 foot container makes a very narrow office.

Don,
Thank you for the reply. I'm glad you found a good solution. I've owned several containers and found that while they are lacking in some things, they do a wonderful job of meeting the "temporary" requirement for building permits.
cheers, I hope your project gets the go-ahead you need.