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A SIX-STOREY residential apartment block in Salt Lake City will offer studios with 320 square feet and one- and two- bedroom rentals at 640 square feet made of shipping containers, reports the Salt Lake City Tribune.

After more than a year of construction delays, Salt Lake City's first experiment with using recycled shipping containers to build a multi-story apartment complex is nearing completion.

Rod Newman, owner of Eco Box Fabricators and the main backer of the Box 500 Apartments, says the boxy six-storey metal complex at 543 S. 500 West is more than 90 per cent finished and its 84 affordable units are expected to open to renters sometime around April. The units, according to Mr Newman, will be kept affordable to those making 60 per cent of the region's median income.

The project has been thrown off schedule repeatedly since construction started in early 2020, with supply-chain problems due to the pandemic and concerns from city building inspectors over some of its materials and techniques. While those delays were frustrating and costly, Mr Newman has said Box 500's bumps also provided valuable research and development information his firm will use to refine future residential construction using shipping containers. "Anything worthwhile takes time," he said. "We're just getting started."