Three Squared Adapts Residential Shipping Containers to Help End COVID-19 Hospital Housing Shortage

DETROIT, March 29, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Amid throngs of daily reports lamenting the critical lack of hospital beds and similar space shortage concerns for morgues in the wake of COVID-19, with makeshift tents being erected on both fronts as a short-term "BAND-AID," one company has been think-tanking what could be a hugely viable solution for all. Detroit-based cargo architecture firm Three Squared, whose steel cargo containers are typically used for innovative multifamily and mixed-use housing applications, is now proffering its state-of-the-art cargo container dwellings not only as relief units for hospital and morgue/mortuary overflow, but also as appropriately-appointed and climate-controlled housing units for doctors and nurses needing to stay close to those patients.

"Amid the crisis, we've been refocusing our residential lodging efforts to instead resolve the current hospital housing crisis," notes Leslie Horn, CEO of Three Squared. "In consultation with several doctors who've shared front-line problems and needs in relation, and through concerted efforts to rally and align with other builders in the shipping container sector, we've identified two distinct gaps in hospital housing and successfully devised two specialized solutions to wholly resolve these needs."

According to Horn, Three Squared's first solution would provide direct and immediate relief for those hospitals facing a bed shortage. Specifically, a mobile cargo unit that is delivered via truck, hooked up to temporary plumbing and power, set on temporary foundations, and covered with a temporary tent structure. Each unit contains two hospital beds, also with a central bathroom with running water. The bathroom also has an exterior door so that doctors and nurses can decontaminate before leaving the unit at any time—a feature suggested by one of the consulting doctors.

Another doctor Three Squared consulted with voiced concern around the shortage of temporary housing for doctors and nurses who need to so stay close by patients while also maintaining necessary social distancing protocols. Thus, the company's second proposed solution involves shipping container units set up in a similar fashion for use as the hospital staff relief—temporary housing for medical staff located near the patient hospital bed cargo units.

"After the pandemic has run its course and the hospital patient and staff-use shipping container structures have achieved their objectives, the cargo units will be picked back up and delivered to a final 'afterlife' resting place as housing for homeless, veterans, disaster relief, college dormitories, food growing operations and more. They can also be easily stacked and stand 'at-the-ready' to assist in future disaster relief efforts," Horn notes.

View full release here: https://tinyurl.com/ucdcda4

SOURCE Three Squared, Inc.