Great news! Discussions are underway regarding finally building a new courthouse. It has taken years to get to this point. Now, to get started, the courthouse planning group needs estimates of the amount of space needed for each court component. “Can’t we just use the space we have now?” someone asks. “Well, no,” you say, because only one of the four clerk’s office filing windows has been used since e-filing became the norm. “Does anyone know where the current space standards are stored?” someone else asks. “I think the printed standards are in a binder in the clerk’s office…but that’s very old. I’m not sure where the updates or addendums are stored…if we have them at all.”
Imagine how much easier this process would be if the design guide standards were automated and integrated into a courthouse space calculator tool. Well, for the past 25 years, I have been involved as a programmer and court’s consultant in planning and coding such tools. The tools have evolved from simple spreadsheets to desktop programs with local databases to web-based apps with cloud-based databases and multiuser functionality. The ability for court personnel to share scenarios and outcomes online has made these tools invaluable.
This can (and should) be done for any court system at any level. There are many benefits to taking the time upfront to create an automated design guide/space calculator tool that does the following:
- identifies all spaces in a courthouse,
- holds all up-to-date standard values for the size of each of those spaces,
- lays out criteria to determine how many of each space type is required, and
- calculates the size of the new space based on the design guide and a few assumptions.
Why You Need a Space Tool
Here are the top 4 reasons every court manager and courthouse portfolio manager needs such a tool.
- Objectivity - The top reason to create an automated space calculator based on a design guide is the objectivity of the resulting calculations. For example, every courtroom of the same type is allocated the same amount of space. This helps eliminate the often significant differences in the perceived space needs between all parties involved. The tool, however, allows modifications to be made and it collects pertinent information (date, authority, previous amount of space, new amount of space) to track every modification.
- Consistency across multiple facilities – one of the major difficulties with calculating space between multiple locations is determining how to account for differences among them. For example, the role of clerks in one courthouse may vary significantly from the role of their counterparts in another location. Therefore, their space needs may be different. A robust space calculator tool can easily account for these variances and, through answering a short series of questions, these differences can be collected and addressed. Standards can then be applied while accounting for such nuances.
- Ability to run “what if" scenarios quickly – When your court finally gets the OK to plan for a new facility, you have a blank canvas to fill and a strict budget (typically) to abide by. A space calculator tool is the perfect assistant to answer the question, “Where do we start?” You can start by entering your knowns into the tool. You may know that your new facility will house two courtrooms, a clerk’s office staff that handles X number of cases per year, a sallyport, two holding cells, and support space for these activities. You quickly enter the specific answers to questions posed by the tool. And, just as quickly, the tool lets you know exactly how much space such a courthouse would need, including the support spaces and circulation spaces. As you add functions and remove groups and tweak your courthouse, the tool provides the design guide standard size, regardless of who runs it.
- Saving of time and money – Running as many courthouse layout scenarios as needed to gain consensus saves time and money in the end. By being able to ultimately provide the courthouse architect with details about the specific spaces needed, months of back and forth on the front end can be eliminated. This time savings translates directly to money saved. And, as the design process progresses, you will have your design guide standard baseline to refer to with every proposed architectural design change.
Don't Overlook this Team Member!
Starting the process of building a courthouse can be daunting. Where do you start? Regardless of how much money has been allocated for the project or how quickly it needs to be completed, putting your team together is the first step. And, there may be no more valuable team member than a design guide standard/space calculator tool that quantifies your team’s ideas and, in the end, provides the necessary cold shower of reality. It’s always nice to have that member to keep things real and to keep the team moving forward.
