732 El Camino Real - A Multifamily Housing Case Study
Developer: The Pacific Companies/AMG
Design: Architects Orange
Preconstruction: Prefab Logic
Engineering: PFL Engineering
GC: Pacific West Builders
Classification: Affordable Multifamily
Buildings: 1
Units: 134
Developed by The Pacific Companies and AMG & Associates, this property puts super-high-quality living within reach for limited incomes in one of America’s three most expensive counties.
In the battle against the housing crisis, Autovol has added a new silver bullet to Pacific West Builders, the construction arm of The Pacific Companies. The Pacific Companies has tapped Autovol to build the living units for more than 20 multifamily projects in California over the past five years. During that time The Pacific Companies was recognized as America's top producer of affordable housing, and Autovol has become America's top modular producer of multifamily housing.
732 El Camino Real sits on one of San Mateo County's busiest boulevards. Besides the headquarters of YouTube, Walmart Global eCommerce, and other big names, the new multifamily community is just minutes from the San Francisco Airport. It has quickly brought 134 apartments within reach in an area where “low-income” status tops out at $100,000.
San Mateo County averages 8,000 people per square mile. Jonathan points out that this compounds the challenge of making enough housing available to meet the need. Building housing in very high-density areas like this is especially challenging and expensive, making it impossible for builders to keep up with growth. He says the offsite approach has made the impossible possible.
"You can imagine the logistics of trying to stick-frame this building without any place to put the sticks," says Jonathan Schink, supervisor of 732 Camino Real. "Two weeks of craning modules in place was much easier than trying to manage all the complex logistics of a high-density site over many weeks."
Each living unit at 732 El Camino Real was built in the Autovol plant by a combination of robots and Autovol's skilled builders who call themselves Solutioneers. Working in a highly efficient, dedicated site where robots do the heavy lifting, Autovol's Solutioneers completed all 134 units in 51 days. The living units left the factory as fully functioning apartments—approved in factory by California inspectors to meet all applicable codes. Major portions of the building's common areas were produced at Autovol during this time as well.
"Going into the project, I was a bit skeptical. But I was very surprised at how efficiently the units went together," he says. "I've built this same type of building 50 times. I'm pretty familiar with some of the typical architectural mistakes, so I was skeptical you could build 100+ boxes 800 miles away and not see architectural errors when it all came together here in San Bruno. We didn't have any of that."
Now that he's seen the impact by doing most of the construction many miles away at Autovol, Jonathan is optimistic based on efficiency and speed—but also quality.
"The site is very logistically challenged. It's a very tight site," he says. "We're efficiently building 134 residences on a half-acre property. With this modular approach, you're certainly going to save 4 to 6 months, but more importantly, the quality of the work is more consistent. These modules are A+ construction, and with such a push to go fast these days, you just don't see this kind of quality."
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