| San José City Hall | |
|---|---|
 | |
 Interactive map of the San José City Hall area | |
| General information | |
| Status | Completed |
| Type | Government offices |
| Architectural style | Postmodern |
| Location | 200 East Santa Clara Street,San Jose, California, United States |
| Coordinates | 37°20′16″N121°53′10″W / 37.3378°N 121.8861°W /37.3378; -121.8861 |
| Current tenants |
|
| Groundbreaking | 2002; 24 years ago (2002) |
| Opened | October 15, 2005; 20 years ago (2005-10-15) |
| Cost | $384 million[2] |
| Height | |
| Roof | 86.9 m (285 ft)[1] |
| Technical details | |
| Floor count | 18 2 below ground |
| Floor area | 49,240 m2 (530,000 sq ft) |
| Lifts/elevators | 11 |
| Design and construction | |
| Architects |
|
| Engineer | Englekirk & Sabol[3] |
| Main contractor |
|
| References | |
| [4][5][6] | |
San José City Hall is the seat of themunicipal government ofSan Jose, California. Located inDowntown San Jose, it was designed byPritzker Prize-winning architectRichard Meier in aPostmodern style. It consists of an 18-story tower, an iconic glass rotunda, and a city council chamber wing, laid out within a two-block-longpublic square known asSan José Civic Plaza. The tower rises 285 feet (87 m) above the plaza, making it thefourth tallest building in San Jose.
San Jose has had six seats of government inits history. City officials met inDowntown San Jose from before the city's incorporation in 1850 until the 1950s, when a modern City Hall was built at Civic Center to the north. The current City Hall's construction capped a period of rapid growth for the city during thedot-com bubble. Its opening in 2005 marked the municipal government's return downtown after half a century in an office park setting.
City Hall was designed byRichard Meier, who also designed theGetty Center inLos Angeles, theBarcelona Museum of Contemporary Art inBarcelona,The Hague City Hall, and numerous other buildings around the world. San Jose–based Steinberg Architects was the associate architect. Meier'sPostmodern design is most influenced by that ofLe Corbusier and contrasts with theBeaux-Arts city halls inSan Francisco andOakland.[2][7]
City Hall consists of three wings totaling 530,000 square feet (49,000 m2) within a 32-acre (13 ha) Civic Plaza complex:[3][8]
City Hall's tall, thin tower is designed to withstand significant shaking from nearby faults, which include theSilver Creek,Calaveras,Hayward, andSan Andreas faults. The building is stabilized by full-height, concreteshear walls on the north and south sides of the building, which are likened to bookends. They are connected to a steelmoment-resisting frame across the west and east sides.[3][13]
The current city hall is San Jose's sixth government headquarters building, reflecting San Jose's rise from a small farming town to one of the largest cities in the country.[14]
The City of San José's predecessor,elPueblo de San José de Guadalupe, was headquartered at ajuzgado, a single-story adobe structure built in 1785 near theRío de Guadalupe. Similar to a rural Americancourthouse, it served as the main administrative building, with an assembly, court, and jail, and offices for thecomisionado andalcalde.[15] Today, the pueblo's original site is marked by aCalifornia Historical Landmark marker, part of theJuan Bautista de Anza National Historic Trail, in the Civic Center complex north of downtown.[16]
Around 1797, thepobladores (settlers) of San José moved south to higher ground to avoid flooding from the river.[16] A newjuzgado was built the next year in the middle of the present-day intersection of South Market and Post streets.[17][18] San José had by this time become the political center ofAlta California del Norte.[16] On July 14, 1846, during theMexican–American War, CaptainThomas Fallon's men took over thejuzgado and raised theAmerican flag over San José for the first time at this location.[17] The event is now commemorated by a statue in Pellier Park. In early 1847, the pueblo's first American school held classes at thejuzgado in full view of prisoners.[19]
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San Jose was incorporated as one of California's first cities on March 27, 1850. MayorJosiah Belden convened the city council for the first time on April 13 at thejuzgado, a short distance from theplaza mayor where the firstCalifornia State Legislature was in session.[20] Thejuzgado was sold and torn down that July. For the next few years, the city government operated out of rented buildings, including the former state capitol in the plaza.[15][21] Some of thejuzgado's adobe walls may have been incorporated into the Alcantara Building that now stands at the site. Additionally, some of the bricks were used in the construction of San Jose's first post office, now part of theSan Jose Museum of Art.[17]
On August 14, 1854, a city committee called for proposals to build a permanent city hall. On October 16, voters approved a $20,000 budget for the new building (equivalent to $546,754 in 2024). The city purchased a site on North Market Street.[22]Levi Goodrich designed the two-story building, which measured 55 by 40 feet (17 m × 12 m). The Common Council (as the city council was then called) met there for the first time on April 16, 1855.[23] Originally, the building had a Gothic façade andparapet. Around 1870, it was rebuilt with a Greek exterior.[15][24] The Santa Clara Countysuperior court rented the second floor from September 1, 1860,[25] untila new courthouse was built at St. James Square.[26] The building was destroyed in the1906 San Francisco earthquake.[27] TheSan José Fire Department's Torrent Engine Company #2 was stationed at San Jose City Hall from 1869 to 1951, when the San Jose Central Fire Station opened.[28]
After theChinatown atMarket Plaza burnt to the ground in 1887, voters approved a new city hall building to be built in the center of the plaza.[26][29] W. J. Wolcott oversaw construction of the building, which cost $139,482 (equivalent to $4.4 million in 2024).[30][31] At the height ofanti-Chinese sentiment, the city council prohibited the use of Chinese labor,[29] even though the building was located across from theMarket Street Chinatown.[32] The city hall was dedicated by MayorSamuel Boring on April 17, 1889.[29]
The brick and terracotta building was designed by San Jose–based, self-taught architectTheodore Lenzen based on German,Italianate, andVictorian designs withFrench Empire detailing. TheAmerican Institute of Architects has been critical of the design, which has been called "bastardbaroque" and likened to a "gingerbread house". TheSan José Public Library was located on the second floor. The city jail, with a drive-through entrance anddrunk tank, occupied the basement.[15][29][30][33][34]
The building was heavily damaged in the1906 San Francisco earthquake.[30]
In 1931, the city commissioned the urban plannerHarland Bartholomew to design aCity Beautiful civic center within St. James Park modeled onDaniel Burnham'sCivic Center in San Francisco. Bartholomew presented his plan on August 6, 1931, calling for new city and county administration buildings, a post office, museums, and a civic auditorium. However, the city failed to raise the necessary funds, while the county, post office, and library opted for their own plans. St. James Park became infamous internationally for the 1933 lynching of two men accused of kidnapping and murderingBrooke Hart. Bartholomew's plans for the park were scrapped, as were subsequent civic center plans in the 1940s and 1950s.[35]
During the postwar construction boom, City ManagerDutch Hamann and the business community, led by the San JoseMercury andNews, attempted four times to convince voters to approve a new city hall that would improve San Jose's image as a major city,[36] finally succeeding in 1952.[37] The new city hall would sit on 10.1 acres (4.1 ha) of donated land about one-half mile (0.80 km) north of the downtown area. It would be colocated with federal, state, and county facilities at the Civic Center at North First and Mission streets, near the site of the original pueblo. A $1.98 million bond measure (equivalent to $18 million in 2024) was approved in 1955 to finance the new building. Donald Francis Haines designed a curved, four-story-tall building with influences fromModern architecture and theInternational Style. It was one of thousands of Modern buildings built in the city between 1950 and 1970.[37][38][39]
Construction began in 1956.[40] As the city outgrew the old building, theSan Jose Police Department moved into temporary offices.[41] The new 106,000-square-foot (9,800 m2), 400-foot-long (120 m) building was dedicated on March 27, 1958. The building was built by Carl N. Swenson Company at a cost of just over $2.6 million ($21.6 million in 2024). It was one of the firstcurtain wall buildings erected on the West Coast during the Modern period.[15][42]
Moving thousands of city employees out of the downtown area exacerbated theurban decay that resulted in part from Hamann's aggressive program of suburban development. Beginning in 1956, city leaders attempted to revitalize the urban core by clearing older buildings for redevelopment.[43] Despite pleas by historianClyde Arbuckle, the previous city hall in Plaza Park was demolished in June 1958, a move now widely regretted by city officials.[15][42] The building's cornerstone was placed in the ground about 50 yards (46 m) from its original location.[44] Though the park remained in the center of Market Street, the surrounding blocks downtown largely sat vacant for decades.[43]
Over the next few decades, the city and Santa Clara County continued developing the Civic Center complex. In 1961, the county opened a seven-story Government Center building adjacent to City Hall,[45] followed by a ten-story, rust-colored east wing in 1974[46] and the county's Main Jail in 1989.[47] A six-story, 7,000-square-foot (650 m2) annex, designed by Norman "Bud" Curtis, was added to the City Hall building in the 1970s.[15][48][49] The overall 113,000-square-foot (10,500 m2) building housed 1,100 city employees.[39][49]
In 1987, theCivic Center light rail station opened on North First Street adjacent to City Hall, providing rail access to the downtown area.
The building is now considered seismically unsound, and it is contaminated byasbestos.[39] Renovating it would cost $46 million.[49]
In the 1990s, taking advantage of growth from thedot-com boom, the city began planning a return downtown. A new city hall would bolster theurban renewal program that had finally begun turning the vast expanse of downtown parking lots into a retail and entertainment district. It would also consolidate city offices. The city had been spending about $6 million annually to lease office space downtown, but City Hall's location at Civic Center had become a major inconvenience.[8][50] City employees had to drive several miles between meetings, and the City Hall parking lot on Mission Street could only accommodate senior staff.[51]
On November 5, 1996, voters passed Measure I by more than 60% to authorize the relocation.[1] In August 1998, an urban design study bySasaki Associates recommended a site along East Santa Clara Street nearSan Jose State University, with the intention of expanding the downtown core eastward. Later that year,Richard Meier was selected as the new building's architect. Initially, he suggested incorporating a venue for theSan Jose Symphony to keep the complex vibrant during weekends.[50] In 1999, MayorRon Gonzales and the city council rejected all of Meier's first round of proposals, which called for a low-rise office block, and insisted on a more iconic structure that featured a rotunda.[7]
Construction was originally estimated to cost $178 million, and a 1998 budget allocated $214 million to the project (equivalent to $383 million in 2024).[14][30] However, former mayorAlbert J. Ruffo successfully sued the city to stop it from usingSan Jose Redevelopment Agency funds for the project. A 2002 suit also tried unsuccessfully to keep the city from demolishing the 1894 Fox-Markovits Building to make way for one of the two planned parking garages.[3] The resulting delays in land acquisition, combined with design changes required by city officials, caused the price to jump to $343 million by 2002 ($570 million in 2024), even as the city faced a budget shortfall of over $30 million after the collapse of thedot-com bubble. The cost overrun prompted the city council to explore leasing theSobrato Office Tower, which was under construction and awaiting a tenant.[52] Nevertheless, the project broke ground later that year.[3][53]
Employees began moving into the new City Hall in August 2005, two years later than originally planned.[54] The building officially opened on October 15, 2005. The project ultimately cost $384 million ($591 million in 2024),[14][30] possibly more than any other city hall in the country,[55][56] with the rotunda alone costing $40 million ($61.6 million in 2024).[2] Due in part to controversies over its construction cost, the building was initially exempted from City Council's 2001 policy of requiring all municipal buildings larger than 10,000 square feet (930 m2) to receiveLEED Silver or higher certification.[3] It eventually received LEED Platinum for Existing Buildings certification in March 2009, becoming the first city hall in the country to receive this certification.[1]
In 2011, the city sold the former Civic Center city hall to Santa Clara County for $10 million[57] to settle a $62.9 million county lawsuit against the city for unpaid bills.[39]
Starbucks planned to open a café at the complex but pulled out in 2014 amid debate over whether the city should enforceliving wage rules at the location.[2][58] In 2015, theUnited States Patent and Trademark Office opened a 35,194-square-foot (3,269.6 m2)Silicon Valley satellite office in a part of the west wing building of City Hall that had until then been vacant. The office includes patent examiners andPatent Trial and Appeal Board judges.[59][60]
On November 19, 2024, the rotunda was rededicated as theJanet Gray Hayes Rotunda in honor of San Jose's former mayor, the first woman mayor of a major U.S. city.[61]
The front plaza facing East Santa Clara Street features "Waterscape", a 2005 water sculpture byAnna Valentina Murch and Douglas Hollis. It consists of a cascading fountain made of granite slabs, boulders that provide seating, and 20-foot-tall (6.1 m) vanes thatspray mist onto the plaza from above to simulate fog and cool the plaza.[3][62][63] The boulders also serve as bollards to protect the plaza against a vehicle attack.[51] The rear courtyard at the end of South 5th Street originally featured ablack bamboo grove.[2][64]
Civic Plaza attracts relatively little foot traffic apart from organized events, owing in part to heat reflecting off City Hall and a lack of shade.[65] However, temporary art installations occasionally attract crowds from the busier parts of downtown. Alight art installation titled "Sonic Runway" illuminated the sidewalk on Santa Clara Street from November 3, 2017, to March 9, 2018, as part of the Playa to the Paseo partnership between the city and theBurning Man project.[66][67] It returned in 2021 and is expected to remain on display until 2028. It consists of a tunnel of colorfully lit, pedestrian-activated arches set to music.[68]
A 2005 series of 16 art installations by Andrew Leicester, titled "Parade of Floats", adorns various sidewalks in the neighborhood immediately surrounding city hall. Each float represents an element of San Jose's cultural and historical diversity.[63][69] The floor of the westbound City Hallbus rapid transit stop features a collage that illustrates thepatent filing process.[70]
A 9-foot-tall (2.7 m), 4,000-pound (1,800 kg) statue ofChristopher Columbus was installed in the lobby of the Civic Center facility in 1958 to celebrate the local Italian-American community. In the 2000s, the city moved it to the lobby of the current city hall. On March 10, 2018, the statue was removed from city hall and relocated to the Italian American Heritage Foundation following a petition by theBrown Berets.[71][72]
City Hall has receivedLEED Platinum certification for its environmentally friendly design. It is the largest LEED-certified municipal building in San Jose.[1][11] The tower employsdaylighting techniques, including high ceilings, a thin floor plan, and side elevator shafts, to take advantage of an average 300 days of sun annually and reduce artificial lighting costs. Abrise soleil on the tower's west side provide shade during the summer, reducing cooling costs.[2][3][10]
City Hall usesrecycled water extensively, including for flushing toilets and irrigating landscaping. The "Waterscape" installation in front includes a rock fountain that also uses recycled water; however, the accompanying misting vanes must use potable water due to health regulations. The vanes operate during the warmer half of the year, spraying a total of 230 US gallons (870 L; 190 imp gal) annually.[73]
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The front plaza facing East Santa Clara Street was designed as apublic square. It regularly attracts political demonstrations. In 2007 and 2008, it was the site of protests and ahunger strike byLý Tống regarding city council's initial refusal to name the city's main Vietnamese business districtLittle Saigon.[2][74] Local versions of national rallies have been held at City Hall, includingan immigration reform protest in 2006;Occupy San José in 2011;Not My Presidents Day, theTax March, theMarch for Science, and theWomen's March in 2017;March for Our Lives andFamilies Belong Together in 2018; and theGeorge Floyd protest in 2020. The previous city hall also attracted political demonstrations, including marches following the police shooting deaths of John Henry Smith in 1971[75] andBich Cau Thi Tran in 2003.[76] The plaza also hosts vigils, such as one for victims of the2021 VTA rail yard shooting.[77]
An automated lighting system was installed in the rotunda in June 2017, enabling the tower and rotunda to be colorfully lit to mark special occasions.[78]
The City Hall tower is home to aperegrine falcon named Clara, and her currenttiercel, named "Esteban Colbert" afterStephen Colbert, of whom MayorChuck Reed was said to be a fan.[79] The original falcons, named Jose and Clara after the city andSanta Clara County, produced three offspring, named Spirit, Hiko, and Esperanza. In 2008, Clara and her then-mate Carlos had three chicks, Cielo and Meyye, both girls, and Mercury, a boy.[79]
Civic Plaza is located on the eastern edge of the downtown San Jose retail area. It is bounded by East Santa Clara Street to the north, South 4th Street to the west, South 6th Street to the east, and a dead end of South 5th Street to the south. TheRotary Club of San Jose maintains a summit center adjacent to City Hall.San Jose State University's main campus and theDr. Martin Luther King Jr. Library are located one block to the south across East San Fernando Street. ALee's Sandwiches store is located across South 6th Street, at the site where the chain began in 1983. The formerFirst Presbyterian Church of San Jose is located directly across East Santa Clara Street, andOur Lady of La Vang Parish is located two blocks to the east.
The Civic Plaza complex includes an underground parking garage for city officials, as well as a city-owned public parking garage one block to the north.[51] Unlike the Civic Center city hall, the current city hall lacks direct access to freeways. TheSanta Clara Valley Transportation Authority'sSanta Clara light rail station is located two blocks to the west.
In 2000, Santa Clara County voters approved Measure A to fund a package of public transportation projects, including a Downtown/East Valley light rail line along East Santa Clara Street that would have stopped at City Hall.[80] However, subsequent budget cuts forced the project to be scaled back to an extension of an existing light rail line that does not serve City Hall.[81] Instead, an Alum Rock–Santa Clarabus rapid transit line was built along the street, with a City Hall stop at 6th Street.
A Civic Plaza/San José State University station was also planned as part of theSilicon Valley BART extension. It would have been located underneath East Santa Clara Street between 4th and 7th streets, with station entrances in the vicinity of City Hall. In May 2007, the proposed station was consolidated with thePlaza de César Chávez station into a singleDowntown San José station between 2nd and San Pedro streets, in order to reduce costs and more directly connect toVTA light rail lines.[82]
The City Hall rotunda appears in the 2009Bollywood filmLove Aaj Kal as the corporate headquarters of the fictional architectural firm Golden Gate Engineering.[83][84] It also appeared in an August 2013 episode of the CBS television seriesUnforgettable as aNew York City auditorium.[85]
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