Talk Bronx New York

Jury Duty Not ‘Hard Time’ To Serve In New Courthouse 

By ROBERT HILFERTY
February 26, 2008

For the first time in my life, I could imagine actually looking forward to jury duty. Unlike those ponderous fortresses that typically shroud one’s civic obligation in gloom and doom, architect Rafael Viñoly’s Bronx County Hall of Justice, which opened its doors last month, epitomizes the notion of “innocent until proven guilty” — and doesn’t condemn the rest of us who must pass judgment. It is, perhaps, the least Kafkaesque courthouse in the city — a welcoming, translucent nine-story structure on 161st Street with a long, elegant façade of corrugated, green-tinted glass resembling Astor Piazzolla’s bandonéon.

Its project director, Fred Wilmers, called the courthouse “a metaphor for the transparency of the judicial system, the openness of government.” It is an apt description of this structure, with its street-level entrance and its exhilarating, light-filled lobby that’s not the least bit oppressive.

It’s an architectural (and a metaphorical) antidote to the concrete, bunker-style Bronx Family/Criminal Courthouse across the street, and it’s less intimidating than the Bronx County Courthouse a few blocks west, near Yankee Stadium. The new $421 million building, impressive but not imposing, takes on some of the criminal functions of its overextended neighbors.

You still have to pass through metal detectors and X-ray machines before gaining entry, but Mr. Viñoly’s idea of respect for the public above authority is delightfully successful. The centerpiece of the L-shaped configuration is the jury assembly room, a rotunda-like space that could hold 570 people in the center of the lobby. Skylights allow daylight to flood the space, which symbolically puts the juror at the center of the judicial process with dignity. What an idea.

After you are assigned a case, you can take an elevator to one of the four court-dedicated floors. Or you can stroll up the ramp that spirals around the rotunda to the second floor, offering a continuous view of the tree- and bench-dotted courtyard outside. It’s the designer’s stated hope that once this public plaza is opened later this year, the staff and local residents take their lunch breaks out there; a greenmarket has even been invited to camp out in this neighborhood-integrating social space, graced by a site-specific granite sculpture of interlocking cubes by Cai Guo-Qiang, who currently has a show at the Guggenheim.

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Over budget and delayed, the new Bronx courthouse.

New Bronx Courthouse Finally Scheduled To Open!

After many delays and cost overruns of nearly $100 million, the state’s newest courthouse, the Bronx County Hall of Justice, is scheduled to open next week, officials said on Thursday.

Cases will be heard on Monday at the $421 million courthouse, in the South Bronx near the borough’s other large courthouses, said Ronald Younkins, chief of operations for the Office of Court Administration.

Construction began in 2001 on the nine-story, 775,000-square-foot building that stretches for two blocks along 161st Street.

It was to be completed in 2005 at a cost of $325 million. But delays occurred because of a variety of problems, including soil contaminated with petroleum and the disqualification of the original contractor because of suspicions of mob ties.

The 200-space underground garage, which was declared unsafe after inspectors found that its ceiling had bowed, will not open along with the rest of the courthouse, officials said. It was unclear when it would be repaired, but engineers have determined that the garage problems are not a threat to the building’s overall structural safety.

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