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Mar. 13, 2004. 01:00 AM
Court design a crime
The buildings reflect a system that's `a clearing house of human misery' Nasty, bare, they no longer reflect an awesome power, <
CHRISTOPHER HUME
ARCHITECTURE CRITIC OSGOODE HALL OLD CITY HALL361 UNIVERSITY AVE.2201 FINCH AVE. W. 1000 FINCH AVE. W.1911 EGLINTON AVE. E.
Given the sorry state of Ontario courthouses, perhaps it's just as well that justice is blind.
Though there was a time when the courthouse was the proudest building in town, today they are shabby spaces carved out of strip malls in the middle of nowhere. To visit "courts of justice" such as 1000 Finch Ave. W., 2201 Finch Ave. W. and 1911 Eglinton Ave. E. is to spend time in some of the most depressing places in the GTA.
One might expect the enormous powers of the courts to be reflected in the architecture, but that's no longer the case. Indeed, if the design of these buildings says anything, it's that the judicial system has become a clearing house of human misery. The players all know their parts, but the stage is nasty and bare.
"There's nothing casual about what we do," notes retired Superior Court judge, Patrick LeSage.
"Complainants, who often turn out to be victims, and accused often find themselves enmeshed in really shabby surroundings. That's not right. Courts don't have to be elaborate or ornate, but they don't have to be located over a shopping plaza. Just as with our legislatures, city halls and churches, I believe courts should reflect the importance and dignity of what goes on within them."
This idea lies at the heart of some courthouses, especially those built in the 19th and early 20th centuries. Osgoode Hall and Old City Hall, and 361 University Ave., for example, were conceived as architectural embodiments of principles of justice that go all the way back to Plato and Aristotle.
They incorporate a vocabulary of symbolism that could be understood by educated people around the world. It is a language of crime and punishment, of responsibility, retribution, redemption, restitution and rehabilitation. Underlying the architecture is a clear desire to impart a sense of gravitas and remind those present of the awesome powers held by the state, including that of violence and until recently, life and death itself.
The last vestiges of this symbolism are the Canadian coat-of-arms, which hangs behind the judge's chair in even the most degraded courthouse and, perhaps, the gowns those judges wear.
The coat-of-arms is a heraldic reminder of state authority and its personification, the Crown, Queen Elizabeth. The gowns, on the other hand, are worn at judges' discretion. Interestingly, they seem to be more important as the quality of courtroom architecture declines.
Mr. Justice John Kerr, who toils in the Eglinton Ave. Scarborough courthouse, a nondescript low-rise box next to a Wal-Mart, never wore his gowns when he worked at Old City Hall. Since moving north, however, he dons them daily.
"In the suburbs we all wear our gowns," Kerr explains. "You feel better wearing it, more like a judge. In Scarborough, the need for gowns is greater."
As for the architecture of the Scarborough courthouse, Kerr admits it "doesn't have any distinctive features that cause people to compare it to well-designed courthouses." But, he insists, "it's functional."
By contrast, North York's courthouse, 1000 Finch, couldn't even be called functional. It opened in the late '70s as a temporary courthouse and has been deteriorating ever since. Three decades later, it is a model of what a courthouse shouldn't look like.
"What amazes me is the indignity of the place," laments criminal lawyer Robert Rotenberg. "The architecture sends you a clear signal that, yes, you're disenfranchised. It tells you you're at the bottom of the totem pole."
Former crown prosecutor Uriel Priwes agrees. "I think architecture does affect the way people respect justice," he argues. "Perception is a very important part of it."
"Welcome to the courthouse behind a used car lot," says criminal lawyer Walter Fox. "This is what architecture looks like in a business where the customer is always wrong. First of all, it would be great to have a place where you could meet in private with your client. A court should be a place where you don't want to go, but not because of the cigarette butts."
Most of those butts are on the ground at the entrance to 1000 Finch, where groups of smokers, mostly young males, await justice. The front doors are at the top of a short concrete stairway. "All persons entering this courthouse are subject to search," reads a sign on one door.
Inside, long narrow hallways do double duty as waiting rooms and consultation areas. The courtrooms, windowless and featureless, feel disconnected and isolated.
At 2201 Finch, the materials — wood and stone instead of drywall and linoleum — are better and the spaces less constricted. Still, the results are anonymous and strangely commercial. There is a layer of civility as thin as the wood veneer on the table in the counsels' lounge.
Then there's the location, inaccessible except by car, east of Highway 400 and west of nowhere. Frontier justice might not have been the idea, but that's how it looks, though the frontier here is the space between suburbia and exurbia, the city and its hinterland, a sprawl of industrial slabs, malls, parking lots.
"I could live with this place except for the location," a cop waiting to give evidence says grumpily.
By comparison, the classical monumentality of Osgoode Hall comes not just from a different century but a different world. The sense of history, sophistication and order that informs this impressive structure has long since vanished from the courtroom. That's not surprising, of course, but the problems with contemporary judicial architecture have little to do with the absence of coffered ceilings and columned porticos. The issue is more about quality of space, not the beauty of the details. In the 21st century, the courthouse must regain its lost humanity, if not its illusions of grandeur.
A good place to start would be the waiting rooms, those dreary, neglected areas where the guilty, the innocent and everyone in between sit side-by-side and cheek-by-jowl. These forgotten, left-over spaces are actually more dehumanizing than the courtrooms themselves, no matter how generic. To enter these dispiriting halls is to feel cut off, abandoned and alone. Without windows, natural light, or any point of contact with the larger world beyond the building, they become intermediate zones. Here, people become spectators as well as participants. Everyone plays a part, regardless of who they are or what they've done.
They might be innocent until proven guilty, but in places like these, it can be hard to tell the difference.
Mar. 13, 2004. 01:00 AM
Court design a crime
The buildings reflect a system that's `a clearing house of human misery' Nasty, bare, they no longer reflect an awesome power, <
CHRISTOPHER HUME
ARCHITECTURE CRITIC OSGOODE HALL OLD CITY HALL361 UNIVERSITY AVE.2201 FINCH AVE. W. 1000 FINCH AVE. W.1911 EGLINTON AVE. E.
Given the sorry state of Ontario courthouses, perhaps it's just as well that justice is blind.
Though there was a time when the courthouse was the proudest building in town, today they are shabby spaces carved out of strip malls in the middle of nowhere. To visit "courts of justice" such as 1000 Finch Ave. W., 2201 Finch Ave. W. and 1911 Eglinton Ave. E. is to spend time in some of the most depressing places in the GTA.
One might expect the enormous powers of the courts to be reflected in the architecture, but that's no longer the case. Indeed, if the design of these buildings says anything, it's that the judicial system has become a clearing house of human misery. The players all know their parts, but the stage is nasty and bare.
"There's nothing casual about what we do," notes retired Superior Court judge, Patrick LeSage.
"Complainants, who often turn out to be victims, and accused often find themselves enmeshed in really shabby surroundings. That's not right. Courts don't have to be elaborate or ornate, but they don't have to be located over a shopping plaza. Just as with our legislatures, city halls and churches, I believe courts should reflect the importance and dignity of what goes on within them."
This idea lies at the heart of some courthouses, especially those built in the 19th and early 20th centuries. Osgoode Hall and Old City Hall, and 361 University Ave., for example, were conceived as architectural embodiments of principles of justice that go all the way back to Plato and Aristotle.
They incorporate a vocabulary of symbolism that could be understood by educated people around the world. It is a language of crime and punishment, of responsibility, retribution, redemption, restitution and rehabilitation. Underlying the architecture is a clear desire to impart a sense of gravitas and remind those present of the awesome powers held by the state, including that of violence and until recently, life and death itself.
The last vestiges of this symbolism are the Canadian coat-of-arms, which hangs behind the judge's chair in even the most degraded courthouse and, perhaps, the gowns those judges wear.
The coat-of-arms is a heraldic reminder of state authority and its personification, the Crown, Queen Elizabeth. The gowns, on the other hand, are worn at judges' discretion. Interestingly, they seem to be more important as the quality of courtroom architecture declines.
Mr. Justice John Kerr, who toils in the Eglinton Ave. Scarborough courthouse, a nondescript low-rise box next to a Wal-Mart, never wore his gowns when he worked at Old City Hall. Since moving north, however, he dons them daily.
"In the suburbs we all wear our gowns," Kerr explains. "You feel better wearing it, more like a judge. In Scarborough, the need for gowns is greater."
As for the architecture of the Scarborough courthouse, Kerr admits it "doesn't have any distinctive features that cause people to compare it to well-designed courthouses." But, he insists, "it's functional."
By contrast, North York's courthouse, 1000 Finch, couldn't even be called functional. It opened in the late '70s as a temporary courthouse and has been deteriorating ever since. Three decades later, it is a model of what a courthouse shouldn't look like.
"What amazes me is the indignity of the place," laments criminal lawyer Robert Rotenberg. "The architecture sends you a clear signal that, yes, you're disenfranchised. It tells you you're at the bottom of the totem pole."
Former crown prosecutor Uriel Priwes agrees. "I think architecture does affect the way people respect justice," he argues. "Perception is a very important part of it."
"Welcome to the courthouse behind a used car lot," says criminal lawyer Walter Fox. "This is what architecture looks like in a business where the customer is always wrong. First of all, it would be great to have a place where you could meet in private with your client. A court should be a place where you don't want to go, but not because of the cigarette butts."
Most of those butts are on the ground at the entrance to 1000 Finch, where groups of smokers, mostly young males, await justice. The front doors are at the top of a short concrete stairway. "All persons entering this courthouse are subject to search," reads a sign on one door.
Inside, long narrow hallways do double duty as waiting rooms and consultation areas. The courtrooms, windowless and featureless, feel disconnected and isolated.
At 2201 Finch, the materials — wood and stone instead of drywall and linoleum — are better and the spaces less constricted. Still, the results are anonymous and strangely commercial. There is a layer of civility as thin as the wood veneer on the table in the counsels' lounge.
Then there's the location, inaccessible except by car, east of Highway 400 and west of nowhere. Frontier justice might not have been the idea, but that's how it looks, though the frontier here is the space between suburbia and exurbia, the city and its hinterland, a sprawl of industrial slabs, malls, parking lots.
"I could live with this place except for the location," a cop waiting to give evidence says grumpily.
By comparison, the classical monumentality of Osgoode Hall comes not just from a different century but a different world. The sense of history, sophistication and order that informs this impressive structure has long since vanished from the courtroom. That's not surprising, of course, but the problems with contemporary judicial architecture have little to do with the absence of coffered ceilings and columned porticos. The issue is more about quality of space, not the beauty of the details. In the 21st century, the courthouse must regain its lost humanity, if not its illusions of grandeur.
A good place to start would be the waiting rooms, those dreary, neglected areas where the guilty, the innocent and everyone in between sit side-by-side and cheek-by-jowl. These forgotten, left-over spaces are actually more dehumanizing than the courtrooms themselves, no matter how generic. To enter these dispiriting halls is to feel cut off, abandoned and alone. Without windows, natural light, or any point of contact with the larger world beyond the building, they become intermediate zones. Here, people become spectators as well as participants. Everyone plays a part, regardless of who they are or what they've done.
They might be innocent until proven guilty, but in places like these, it can be hard to tell the difference.