![]() The system is also designed to create incentives–inmates get access to additional amenities and increasingly comfortable accommodations depending on their behavior. All of this is designed so that inmates can establish normative day-to-day routines in a less institutional-feeling environment. Across the campus you’ll find walking paths religious service areas spaces for academic life skills and vocational training and recreation areas for dance, yoga, and meditation. Just like in a higher education environment, the program activities and the spaces they occur in are designed to promote educational, vocational, personal and spiritual growth. Unlike traditional jails and prisons, where most services are housed centrally in enclosed environments with little natural light or outdoor space, this campus is broken down into zones–administrative, communal, programmatic, and housing–connected by a central quad or village green intended for recreation, akin to a typical university. The environment is designed to balance safety and security with independence by minimizing physical and psychological barriers but allowing for clear sight lines, making supervision easy. ![]() The idea is that if you treat inmates as autonomous and responsible human beings (albeit within a controlled and managed environment), they will be more likely to act accordingly. This decentralized approach, with different programs spread out across a campus connected by pedestrian pathways, stems from the freedom of movement concept. When creating the plan for the Las Colinas Detention & Reentry Facility, we didn’t look to traditional prison layouts, but rather to higher education campus planning as inspiration. Lawerence Anderson Photography Education campuses as a model for inmate rehabilitation The architects for these projects operated on the premise that losing one’s freedom is punishment enough, and justice facilities should be designed to address the underlying issues that brought inmates there in order to better prepare them for a successful transition back into society upon release. Both projects resemble small communities or villages rather than hardened, enclosed environments. While new in the U.S., similar approaches to justice facility design have been used in countries across Western Europe for years–Leoben in Austria and Bastoy in Norway in particular have been recognized as two of the most humane prisons in the world. The project uses scientifically-proven research on how light, color, materials, texture, air quality, acoustics and access to nature affect mental and physical well being to inform design decisions throughout. that uses environmental and behavioral psychology to improve the experience and behavior of both inmates and staff. ![]() The Las Colinas Detention & Reentry Facility in San Diego, designed in partnership with KMD and HMC Architects–where we both work–is the first detention facility of its kind in the U.S. One forward-thinking county in California has been willing to bet that the thoughtful application of evidence-based design (much of which uses lessons found in educational and health care design) combined with holistic, treatment-focused programming can make a dent in some of those statistics. Our approach of administering punishment instead of rehabilitation and reintegration isn’t working.
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