A new five-story federal courthouse planned for downtown Mobile is designed to serve as a visual and physical link between the city’s central business district and the historic De Tonti Square neighborhood, an architect told residents at a public presentation.
The $89.3 million project, overseen by Biloxi-based contractor W.G. Yates & Sons, includes both new construction and renovation of the existing John Archibald Campbell United States Courthouse. The new building will rise across from St. Louis Street, near the current courthouse site.
Lee Becker, a partner with Washington-based Hartman-Cox Architects, said his firm’s design team spent time in Mobile studying the city’s character and history before finalizing plans. He described the goal as creating a building that bridges the overlapping business and historic districts while reflecting the surrounding architecture. “Our goal is to try to understand the character of the place and design a building that fits Mobile,” Becker said. “Our goal here is to have this be the best experience of government that works.”
Fred Rendfrey, director of economic development for the Downtown Mobile Alliance, said the current design marks a significant improvement over an earlier glass-heavy concept floated several years ago that carried a price tag of roughly $181.5 million — a cost federal officials ultimately deemed unaffordable. “I think it certainly fits the downtown neighborhood better than the previous design,” Rendfrey said.
The project will proceed in two phases. The first covers construction of a new 155,600-square-foot courthouse building, which the General Services Administration expects to complete by December 2018. That structure will house the federal courts and the U.S. Marshals Service. The second phase involves renovating the existing courthouse, projected for completion by October 2020, which will become the new home for U.S. Bankruptcy Court along with U.S. Probation and Pretrial Services, the federal defenders office and General Services Administration offices.
Design details call for a main entrance off St. Joseph Street featuring a six-foot elevated portico leading into a two-story lobby, with courtrooms and office space placed above ground level to keep them out of reach of potential flooding. Becker said the building will use Alabama limestone sourced from a quarry in Russellville along with Georgia granite, materials selected specifically to visually match the existing courthouse next door. “We are trying to create a two-building family,” he said.
The new courthouse will sit back 50 feet from the curb on all sides, ringed by live oak trees and low iron fencing, with underground parking accessed from St. Louis Street and a service entrance recessed on the building’s west side to keep it out of view from the street.
During the renovation phase, architect Mary Kay Lanzillotta said crews will restore the existing courthouse’s exterior and add ramps to the St. Joseph Street entrance to bring it into compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act, along with restoring the historic lobby.