City of Courts Competition Project

[Project by ArqEstructura]

‘City of Courts’ is a housing system that we designed and submitted to the Low-Rise LA Challenge, which solicited ideas for affordable ‘missing-middle housing’ for the City of Los Angeles, USA. Our scheme proposes infilling empty lots currently zoned for detached single-family houses with two-story zero-setback courtyard housing, i.e. attached multi-family instead of detached single-family. With this system change, a typical mid-block residential lot measuring 50′ x 150′ (approx. 15m x 45m) is able to accommodate up to 6 dwellings instead of one, including a large 4-bedroom live-work house with a ground-floor storefront space for a small business or for working at home. The system is also adaptable to larger 100′ x 150′ (30m x 45m) corner lots, which can accommodate up to 8 dwellings including four 4-BR units with storefront spaces. In the future, as single-family detached houses become a thing of the past, Los Angeles would gradually become a ‘City of Courts’. We wanted to demonstrate the higher urban densities –and affordabilities– that could be achieved with a low-rise housing system based on party walls (a.k.a. firewalls) and outdoor courtyards shared by small groups of neighbors. Needless to say, we didn’t win a prize.