Receive your free commercial brochure Request Now
Onsite Versus Modular For Workers Accommodation
Find out how modular can be the answer to workers accommodation in 2022!
The key to attracting and retaining quality workers who stay onsite is to provide all the comforts of a home away from home! Whether they are seasonal fruit pickers or full-time farm hands, FIFO miners or engineers, tradespeople, educators, health services personnel or any other sector worker providing them with creature comforts is crucial!
Workers are attracted to comfortable, modern accommodation options and are attained through the addition of hotel-like services including access to comfort, catering, laundry and recreation facilities.
Both on-site builds and pre-fabricated modular building practices can provide these facilities, so why use modular buildings instead of traditional bricks and mortar?
- 1. Speed to Occupancy
Modular construction offers time savings of up to 50% over traditional construction.
Traditional construction is mostly linear, meaning stages are typically completed one after the other and not too much can be done until the preceding step is completed.
Modular building on the other hand, involves buildings being designed, engineered and constructed off-site, often while the foundation is completed on the site and permits are being finalised, making for a much more streamlined process.
Inclement weather delays can be common for traditional builds and significantly affect construction time (and cost) while modular is built in a controlled factory environment.
Another factor for remote areas is that getting trades people to stay near the site for the duration of the build can be difficult and expensive. With modular, as most work is completed in a factory, fewer tradespeople are required for a much shorter period in the remote location.
- 2. Cost Predictability
Most people like to know how much things are going to cost before they commit to build, and no one wants to get the phone call to say the project has gone over budget. The building processes for modular are standardised and constructed in a controlled factory environment allowing for quality control. Unexpected changes are often avoided.
This also results in higher levels of security, and so material loss through damage, theft, re-work, weather conditions or under-ordering is far less common than on-site builds.
- 3. Environmental Impact
Sustainability in traditional construction is hard to measure. It largely depends on the contractors and the materials used. Some may prioritise green building processes while others are seeking the fastest most cost-effective solution.
Waste on construction sites accounts for approximately 50% of solid waste every year (World Bank 2021). Modular construction processes produce far less waste than on-site builds.
One of the biggest integrity hazards in construction is moisture. Using dry materials inside the factory can prevent moisture entrapment, thus saving energy and reducing material waste.
With heavy machinery and multiple workers going back and forth to the construction site, the transportation emissions for on-site construction are also high. As modular construction is primarily completed within a factory, the number of on-site emissions is substantially reduced.
- 4. Noise pollution
Another advantage of modular is because the work is done mostly offsite, neighbours and existing workers are not disturbed by ongoing building noise on the site.
Overall, pre-fabricated, modular building are a great choice for onsite workers accommodation because it enables faster occupancy, improved cost predictability, less noise and is more sustainable than traditional on-site construction.
Contact Tasbuilt Commercial today on 1800 639 310 to start a discussion on your workers accommodation needs, we would love to chat to you about how we can facilitate your project.