Over the past week one of the ideas I have been focusing on is putting my building in the site and how it should react with the immediate context and how it will reach out to the overall community. I will focus next on the development of the corner, and investigate how to make the court more inviting while also developing a connection with the flux space I am dealing with in my design and the community at large.
This past Wednesday I attended the Charlotte Mecklenburg county courthouse. Getting there was a journey within itself. I probably drove around the blocks surrounding the courthouse at least twice before finding parking deck that was still a several minute walk from the courthouse itself. Upon arrival, I went into the building through a side entrance. I say side entrance because the main entrance is at the corner of the building. I entered the building and suddenly was at security. It was not implemented within the design of the building and was very close to the entrance. As a side note, when I was leaving, exiting the same way I entered, there were several people in line and the line extended out the door. Granted the exterior portion outside of the door was covered, I do not think that people should have to wait outside just to get into a building. Especially a building where in most cases they are trying to put something behind them and move on with that part of there lives.
The first set of cases that I witnessed were in criminal court. It was a very fast paced event. There was much more activity going on than I thought there would ever be. The observation area was almost completely full. There were lawyers sitting where the jury would be located in a jury trial, waiting for there case or cases, I assume. The criminal defense lawyer represented three or four people one after the other. I was not aware that this happened. She, the lawyer, had a rather large stack of folders in front of her and every time another person would come out of criminal holding, she would just take another folder off the stack and quickly familiarize herself with it. Although most all of the cases were for probation violation, that is still a lot of case work to go through.
I then visited family court. It was on the top level of the court which made sense due to most of the matters going on there would be of more of the personal type. There were paintings on the walls and places to sit outside of the courtrooms. With all of this false sense of security for the children I still felt very uncomfortable inside of that courtroom. It was the only trial that I saw witnesses called, and I thought that it was interesting, but just to think that a family was being separated right there in front of me was in many ways very unsettling. The father was representing himself and the mother had a lawyer. The kids were not not there but people from both sides were called out of the observation/seating area to state and claim how good the respective parents were to and with the kids. Overall, being in there was a good learning experience but I won’t be going back.
The final courtroom I visited was the civil court where at the time the judge was dealing with matters of broken leases and money that was due to the landlords or owners of the property. This was very fast paced. The judge would swear the people in, take a quick look at the lease, find out the amount owed, and just like that it was over almost before it started. There was very little debate from the people being charged. It was as if they new what they owed, but they just wanted to drag it out as long as possible before they had to give up their money.
Court was and wasn’t what I expected it to be. Obviously there was no high drama or enthusiastic questioning, that would have been mentioned, but as I had hoped, justice was being served and people were having ‘their day in court.’ With all that happens in the world around us it is good to know that at the heart of the judicial system, people are doing what they can to make things right. As one last side note, I unfortunately never saw or heard a gavel.
[space + justice] 