Drive past the Northplex plant and you will see workers busy on a two-storey house overlooking the road. Against a clear spring sky, its burgundy walls create a pleasing contrast.
In jest, workers call it the “Taj Mahal”, a designation suggesting nothing like it has been seen in the area before.
What a passing motorist may not appreciate is the building’s standout feature: a modular basement, hailed as revolutionary.
Fully developed, it boasts a rec room, bedroom and bathroom: a unit that could easily house a tenant. So different from the cold concrete basements that spring too readily to mind with many properties.
To Northplex president Frank Deys the development is the realization of an idea that has been germinating for about four years.
“This is the first modular, fully finished basement that I am aware of in Alberta,” he said. “It is unique.”
So special, in fact, that it is expected to bust open markets in places like the City of Edmonton and Fort McMurray.
It augurs well for the ever expanding Barrhead company which now has a $5 million-plus payroll pumping money into the local economy and is competing for the accolade of the town’s largest employer.
Several weeks ago the “Taj Mahal” site looked very different – just a big hole into which the basement was lowered like a colossal piece of lego.
Other pieces followed, until the building looks like it does today: a smart family home nearing completion, with the prospect of immediate rental income. The type of house you would perhaps expect to see in the suburbs, with a bonus room sitting atop the garage.
It is a marker of how far the modular homes industry has come over the last two decades.
“We have been able to bring the industry and its product to where it’s now receptive in urban centres,” said Deys. “The product we are developing has substantial volume in the city.”
To Deys the advantages of a modular basement are many, partly down to its steel-studded, polystyrene construction.
It has an R32 wall insulation value, he said, and natural heating from the treated lumber floor.
“Mechanical and plumbing systems are incorporated into the floors with the basement fully developed, including all rooms, flooring, utility room, bathrooms, etcetera,” said Deys.
He added the walls were lined with OSB – oriented strand board – beneath the drywall, providing additional strength and backing;
Other benefits include:
Use of green technology with reduced carbon footprint and waste. There is a controlled construction environment;
Basements have increased internal space, which can be developed, as frost walls are not needed;
Basements are engineered and built under a CSA approved program; and
Construction timeframe is reduced with little onsite work required, cutting onsite traffic and disturbance in communities.
“There is a lot quicker construction cycle,” said Deys. “We build the upper floor in the plant in 30 days but the entire project would likely be an estimated 90 days.”
Deys reckoned the modular basement would appeal to remote areas where access to subtrades, concrete and materials was a challenge.
It would also benefit existing Northplex clients in First Nations communities where fully developed basements increase the amount of living space available for larger families and elders.
“Another primary use is in urban areas like Fort McMurray and the city of Edmonton, where the demand for legal rental basement suites is substantial in providing affordable housing solutions for homeowners,” he said.
On Friday, May 3, Deys had a chance to sell the virtues of the modular basement to Eric Newell, chairman of Careers: The Next Generation (CNG), a non-profit organization that raises youth awareness of career options through partnerships with government, industry, schools, parents and students.
Newell visited Northplex with members of the Barrhead and District Chamber of Commerce and Pembina Hills school division during a tour of the area, which also took in Barrhead Composite High School and the Alberta Distance Learning Centre.
Deys told of the progress of the modular building industry down the years.
As he spoke, the “Taj Mahal” stood tall in the afternoon sun, visible from the Northplex foyer.
It was possible to imagine it possessing minarets, glinting in the sun’s rays, symbolizing the fulfillment of Deys’ four-year-old dream.
