Building communities, and communities so built

Abstract

Methods of providing a habitable community having usable habitation facilities, and electric and water utilities, including providing a community construction service pack and corresponding community construction services by which such service pack is rapidly installed at a location in need of such rapidly-built community. Such rapidly-built community may be used e.g. to meet the needs of a population suffering from a recent disaster and/or to meet the needs of a population in need of community facilities at a newly-to-be occupied site remote from human habitation and/or human habitation facilities. The invention thus is able to rapidly provide one or more limited-size functional communities on an urgent-need basis where each community initially has its own community local electric service system and its own community local water service, which may be functional even though local housing units may have been severely damaged or destroyed.

1 . A method of providing a habitable community having safely usable human habitation facilities and utilities, the method comprising creating such habitable community by:
 (a) providing about 10 to about 500 portable habitation units, each providing about 175 square feet (about 16.3 square meters) to about 500 square feet (about 46.5 square meters) of habitation area thereby providing habitation services to at least a portion of a population in need of such services, and thereby creating a habitable community at a community situs, comprising
 (i) providing habitation units, including determining a pickup locus for such habitation units, and the community situs for such habitation units, determining a quantity of such habitation units to be shipped to such situs, and shipping the determined quantity of such habitation units to the pickup locus, 
 (ii) moving the habitation units from the pickup locus to habitation sites at the community situs by arranging for transport to the pickup locus, of material handling equipment suitable for handling the habitation units at the pickup locus, receiving the habitation units at the pickup locus and, using the material handling equipment transported to the pickup locus, loading the habitation units onto suitable transport vehicles and transporting the habitation units to the community situs, preparing the community situs, as necessary, thus identifying and/or preparing suitably flat habitation sites configured to receive placement of respective ones of the habitation units, and unloading the habitation units from the transport vehicles and installing the respective habitation units on the suitably flat habitation sites; 
   (b) providing utility services for such community, comprising
 (i) shipping to the community situs, and installing, a community local electric service system comprising, as an electricity source, one or more portable electric generators which are collectively capable of providing an acceptable quantity of electrical power to the about 10 up to about 500 such habitation units, and building, as a local grid, an electrical distribution network connecting the electricity source to the about 10 up to about 500 installed habitation units, so as to create such community local electric service system for the community, and 
 (ii) providing a community local water system comprising a water facility, and a delivery and removal system providing fresh water to the habitation units and removing used water from the habitation units; and 
   (c) making the habitation units available for occupation by people in need of such habitation units at the community situs, thus creating the community of about 10 up to about 500 habitation units occupied by people in need of such habitation units, the habitation units being served by both the community local electric service system and the community local water system.   
     
     
         2 . A method as in  claim 1 , further comprising treating the used water to make such used water satisfactory for re-use as fresh water. 
     
     
         3 . A method as in  claim 1  comprising providing the fresh water to fresh water tanks in the habitation units using a non-pipeline delivery system. 
     
     
         4 . A method as in  claim 1  comprising removing the used water from used water tanks in the habitation units, using a non-pipeline removal system. 
     
     
         5 . A method as in  claim 1  comprising, subsequent to such creating of at least one such community, merging operations responsibilities of such at least one created community local electric service system or such at least one community local water system with operations responsibilities of a corresponding community local electric service system or a community local water system of a second such so-created community. 
     
     
         6 . A method as in  claim 1  comprising converting the community local water system from non-pipeline transport of the fresh water and/or the used water to a community local water system which uses a pipeline network to at least one of transport the fresh water from a primary supply tank to the habitation units or to transport the used water from the habitation units to a water treatment facility. 
     
     
         7 . A method as in  claim 1 , further comprising converting used ocean shipping containers for human habitation use thus to provide the habitation units. 
     
     
         8 . A method as in  claim 1  wherein the step of identifying and/or preparing suitably flat habitation sites includes clearing debris and/or grading land to create such suitably flat habitation sites. 
     
     
         9 . A method as in  claim 1  wherein at least one of providing fresh water to the habitation units and removing used water from the habitation units comprises vehicular transport of such fresh water or such used water to and/or from the habitation units. 
     
     
         10 . A method as in  claim 7  wherein such converting of a used ocean shipping container comprises leaving installed any doors originally mounted on an end of such shipping container, and installing an additional closure wall inwardly of such original doors, and further providing a personnel entry door in such inward wall. 
     
     
         11 . A method as in  claim 1  wherein the method is used to transition at least a portion of a population displaced by disaster into a functioning housing community having safely usable habitation facilities, and stand-alone community local water system and community local electric service system. 
     
     
         12 . A method as in  claim 1  wherein the method is used to create a new community in a location remote from concentrated human habitation and human habitation services. 
     
     
         13 . A community construction service system, comprising:
 (a) a supply of modular habitation units;   (b) a site selection service available to assist a client in selecting one or more sites for construction of a community;   (c) a first transport service providing transport of such habitation units to a pickup locus;   (d) a meeting service, meeting such habitation units when such habitation units arrive at the pickup locus;   (e) a second transport service loading such habitation units onto transport vehicles as necessary and transporting such habitation units from such pickup locus to the selected one or more sites;   (f) an excavation and grading service, excavating and grading one or more individual sites, as necessary, thus identifying suitably flat habitation sites to receive placement of respective ones of the habitation units;   (g) a placement service, unloading respective ones of the habitation units from a respective one or more of the transport vehicles and placing such habitation units on the so-prepared habitation sites;   (h) an electric utility service providing a community local electric system including building a local distribution network connecting to about 10 to about 500 of such so-placed habitation units, sufficient to provide a required minimum quantity of electricity to the about 10 to about 500 habitation units; and   (i) a water utility service providing a community local water system, including fresh water delivery service and used water removal service, to the about 10 to about 500 habitation units.   
     
     
         14 . A community construction service system as in  claim 13 , further comprising a used water treatment service treating the used water removed from the habitation units, suitable to make such used water satisfactory for re-use as fresh water. 
     
     
         15 . A community construction service system as in  claim 13 , further comprising a fresh water service providing fresh water to fresh water tanks in the habitation units using a non-pipeline delivery mechanism. 
     
     
         16 . A community reconstruction system as in  claim 13 , the habitation units comprising used ocean shipping containers converted for human habitation use. 
     
     
         17 . A community reconstruction system as in  claim 13  wherein the excavation and grading service includes clearing debris and/or grading land to create such suitably flat habitation sites. 
     
     
         18 . A community construction service pack, comprising:
 (a) a pre-defined number of about 10 to about 500 portable modular habitation units;   (b) a portable community local electric service system, sized and configured to provide all of the electricity expected to be needed by said about 10 to about 500 portable habitation units, said portable community local electric service system comprising
 (i) one or more portable electric generators having a collective capacity to provide all of the electricity expected to be needed by said about 10 to about 500 portable habitation units, 
 (ii) enough transmission wire to accommodate setting up a wire-based transmission network connecting said generators to all of said about 10 to about 500 habitation units, 
 (iii) suitable switches and controls to control transmission of electricity, generated by said one or more generators, to all of said about 10 to about 500 habitation units through such wire-based transmission network, and 
 (iv) supports and connectors suitable to support said wire in said transmission network; and 
   (c) a portable community local water system sized and configured to provide for all of the fresh water expected to be needed, and to provide for all of the gray water expected to be produced, by the about 10 to about 500 habitation units, said portable community local water system comprising
 (i) a water processing facility including
 (A) one or more portable fresh water tanks having a collective capacity to, in combination with a water source, provide all of the fresh water expected to be needed by said about 10 to about 500 portable habitation units, 
 (B) one or more portable gray water tanks having a collective capacity to, in combination with a water discharge system, receive all of the gray water expected to be collected from said about 10 to about 500 portable habitation units, and 
 
 (ii) one or more vehicles capable of delivering fresh water to the habitation units and receiving gray water from the habitation units. 
   
     
     
         19 . A community construction service pack as in  claim 18 , further comprising a pre-defined vehicular transport capability available to be shipped, as part of said service pack, to the pickup locus, said pre-defined vehicular transport capability having the capacity to assist in transporting the habitation units to a community situs, and to place the habitation units on individual habitation sites. 
     
     
         20 . A community construction service pack as in  claim 18 , further comprising a pre-defined vehicular excavation capability available to be shipped, as part of said service pack, to a community situs, and configured to prepare habitation sites to receive said habitation units. 
     
     
         21 . A community construction service pack as in  claim 18 , further comprising connectors, wires, switches, and controls suitable for connecting a first said portable community local electric service system of a first said community, built from a first said community construction service pack, to a second such portable community local electricity service system of a second said community, built from a second said community construction service pack. 
     
     
         22 . A community construction service pack as in  claim 18 , further comprising sufficient piping and connectors capable of being installed between said water processing facility and said pre-defined number of portable habitation units to carry at least one of
 (i) fresh water from said water processing facility to said habitation units, or   (ii) gray water from said habitation units to said water processing facility.   
     
     
         23 . A community construction service pack as in  claim 18 , further comprising water treatment facilities configured to provide at least one of filtration and chemical treatment of source water for distribution as fresh water, or treatment of used water prior to discharge into the local environment.