The Civic Center district of

Downtown Los Angeles Downtown Los Angeles (DTLA) is the central business district of the city of Los Angeles. It is part of the Central Los Angeles region and covers a area. As of 2020, it contains over 500,000 jobs and has a population of roughly 85,000 residents ...

Los Angeles, California Los Angeles, often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, most populous city in the U.S. state of California, and the commercial, Financial District, Los Angeles, financial, and Culture of Los Angeles, ...

, is the administrative core of the

City of Los Angeles Los Angeles, often referred to by its initials L.A., is the most populous city in the U.S. state of California, and the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Southern California. With an estimated 3,878,704 residents within the city ...

, County of Los Angeles, and a complex of

city A city is a human settlement of a substantial size. The term "city" has different meanings around the world and in some places the settlement can be very small. Even where the term is limited to larger settlements, there is no universally agree ...

, county,

state State most commonly refers to: * State (polity), a centralized political organization that regulates law and society within a territory **Sovereign state, a sovereign polity in international law, commonly referred to as a country **Nation state, a ...

, and federal government offices, buildings, and courthouses. It is located on the site of the former business district of the city during the 1880s and 1890s, since mostly-demolished.

Location

The Civic Center is located in the northern part of

, bordering Bunker Hill, Little Tokyo,

Chinatown Chinatown ( zh, t=唐人街) is the catch-all name for an ethnic enclave of Chinese people located outside Greater China, most often in an urban setting. Areas known as "Chinatown" exist throughout the world, including Europe, Asia, Africa, O ...

, and the Historic Core of the old Downtown. Depending on various district definitions, either the Civic Center or Bunker Hill also contains the Music Center and adjacent

Walt Disney Concert Hall The Walt Disney Concert Hall at 111 South Grand Avenue in downtown Los Angeles, California, is the fourth hall of the Los Angeles Music Center and was designed by Frank Gehry. It was opened on October 23, 2003. Bounded by Hope Street, Grand Av ...

; some maps, for example, place the

Dorothy Chandler Pavilion The Dorothy Chandler Pavilion is one of the halls in the Los Angeles Music Center, which is one of the largest performing arts centers in the United States. The Music Center's other halls include the Mark Taper Forum, Ahmanson Theatre, and Walt ...

in the Civic Center but the Disney Concert Hall in Bunker Hill. The Civic Center has the distinction of containing the largest concentration of government employees in the United States outside of

Washington, D.C. Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly known as Washington or D.C., is the capital city and federal district of the United States. The city is on the Potomac River, across from Virginia, and shares land borders with ...

The reason for the high concentration is simple: Los Angeles is the most populous county in the United States and its second largest city, and houses several state and federal functions for the region.

Other locations

Los Angeles' 1949 master plan called for branch administrative centers throughout the rapidly expanding city. In addition to the main civic center downtown, there is the

West Los Angeles West Los Angeles is an area within the city of Los Angeles, California, United States. The residential and commercial neighborhood is divided by the Interstate 405 freeway, and each side is sometimes treated as a distinct neighborhood, mapped ...

Civic Center in the Westside (built between 1957 and 1965) and the

Van Nuys Van Nuys ( ) is a neighborhood in the central San Fernando Valley region of Los Angeles, California. Home to Van Nuys Airport and the Valley Municipal Building, it is the most populous neighborhood in the San Fernando Valley. History In 1 ...

Civic Center in the

San Fernando Valley The San Fernando Valley, known locally as the Valley, is an urbanized valley in Los Angeles County, Los Angeles County, California. Situated to the north of the Los Angeles Basin, it comprises a large portion of Los Angeles, the Municipal corpo ...

, as well as a neighborhood city hall in San Pedro.

Transportation

The

Regional Connector The Regional Connector Transit Project constructed a light rail tunnel for the Los Angeles Metro Rail system in Downtown Los Angeles. It connected the A and E lines with the former L Line. The A and E lines previously both terminated at 7 ...

that opened on June 16, 2023, serves this area with two stations at

Grand Avenue Arts/Bunker Hill station Grand Avenue Arts/Bunker Hill station is an underground light rail station on the A and E lines of the Los Angeles Metro Rail system. The station also has street level stops for the J Line of the Los Angeles Metro Busway system. The sta ...

and Historic Broadway.

History and planning

Part of what is now the Civic Center occupies what was the central business district (CBD) of the 1880s and 1890s, which was first centered at the southern end of the

Los Angeles Plaza Los Angeles Plaza or Plaza de Los Ángeles is located in Los Angeles, California. It is the central point of the Los Angeles Plaza Historic District. When Spanish Governor Felipe de Neve founded the Pueblo de Los Ángeles, his first act was to lo ...

and grew to the south and west along Main Street, Spring Street and

Broadway Broadway may refer to: Theatre * Broadway Theatre (disambiguation) * Broadway theatre, theatrical productions in professional theatres near Broadway, Manhattan, New York City, U.S. ** Broadway (Manhattan), the street ** Broadway Theatre (53rd Stre ...

, with Third & Broadway forming its southwestern anchor by the mid-1890s. As upscale businesses moved further south into the Historic Core around 1900–1910, the Victorian-era blocks became the "north end" of the business district and became increasingly neglected. There were numerous grand plans for a coherent, modern civic center.

Charles Mulford Robinson Charles Mulford Robinson (1869–1917) was a journalist and a writer who became famous as a pioneering urban planning theorist. He has the greatest influence as a missionary for urban beautification. He was the first Professor for Civic Design at ...

's 1909 plan focused on only a few major buildings between Main, Broadway, First and Temple. Lyman Farewell, Cook and Hall, the Allied Architects Association, the Regional Planning Commission,

Frank Lloyd Wright Frank Lloyd Wright Sr. (June 8, 1867 – April 9, 1959) was an American architect, designer, writer, and educator. He designed List of Frank Lloyd Wright works, more than 1,000 structures over a creative period of 70 years. Wright played a key ...

, William Lee Woollett, Stanton & Stockwell, and landscape architect Ralph Cornell all contributed plans or partial plans, through the late 1950s. There was a "Mulholland Committee" to adopt one, and the location was put to the public for a vote in the late 1920s. The public voted overwhelmingly to confirm the location, but the city and county differed on which plan to adopt. There was later a Civic Center Advisory Committee and then in 1945, a Los Angeles Civic Center Authority. But never was a single plan adopted. Nonetheless, construction of the various buildings proceeded one by one, starting with the City Hall and the Hall of Justice in the 1920s, and the California State Building (already demolished) in 1931. One of these plans which was not adopted in its entirety, the 1947 Civic Center Master Plan, nonetheless envisioned the demolition of the once-tony residential area Bunker Hill, which happened in the 1950s and allowed the Civic Center to expand westward across the northern section of that neighborhood (from Temple south to Second St.). The plan also conceived two County buildings:

Stanley Mosk Courthouse The Stanley Mosk Courthouse is a courthouse in Los Angeles, California home to the Los Angeles County Superior Court. It is located at 110 N. Grand Avenue and 111 N. Hill Street between Temple and First streets, lining Grand Park in the Civic C ...

completed in 1958, the Kenneth Hahn Hall of Administration opening in 1960, designed by

Stanton, Stockwell, Williams and Wilson Stanton & Stockwell was a partnership of Jesse Earl Stanton and William Francis Stockwell, two architects active in Southern California during the mid-20th century. Works attributed to them include: *Los Angeles Mall, bounded by Main, Los Angeles, a ...

in Late Moderne style, flanking either side of a new

pedestrian mall Pedestrian zones (also known as auto-free zones and car-free zones, as pedestrian precincts in British English, and as pedestrian malls in the United States and Australia) are areas of a city or town restricted to use by people on foot or ...

, Civic Center Mall, now part of

Grand Park Gloria Molina Grand Park, commonly known as Grand Park, is a park located in the civic center of Los Angeles, California. First developed in 1966 as the 'Civic Center Mall' with plazas, fountains and a Court of Flags, it is now a part of the ...

. A new Los Angeles County Hall of Records arose nearby in 1962. The 1955, Parker Center, headquarters for the

Los Angeles Police Department The City of Los Angeles Police Department, commonly referred to as Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD), is the primary law enforcement agency of Los Angeles, California, United States. With 8,832 officers and 3,000 civilian staff, it is the th ...

until 2009, opened on the east side of Los Angeles Street, pushing the civic district's eastern boundary to Alameda Street, establishing the current Civic Center footprint such that now nearly the entire area between Hope and Los Angeles streets, US-101, and Second Street, consists of civic buildings - the single large exception being the city block called

Times Mirror Square Times Mirror Square is a complex of buildings on the block bounded by Spring, Broadway, 1st Street, Los Angeles, First and 2nd Street, Los Angeles, Second streets in the Civic Center, Los Angeles, Civic Center district of Downtown Los Angeles. ...

, former headquarters of the ''

Los Angeles Times The ''Los Angeles Times'' is an American Newspaper#Daily, daily newspaper that began publishing in Los Angeles, California, in 1881. Based in the Greater Los Angeles city of El Segundo, California, El Segundo since 2018, it is the List of new ...

'' newspaper. As part of the

Grand Avenue Project The Grand Avenue Project was a government lead revitalization effort for the Bunker Hill neighborhood of Downtown Los Angeles on Grand Avenue and centered around Grand Park, its surrounding county government buildings and its parking lots. ...

was created in 2012, encompassing the former Civic Center Mall and additional areas such that it now stretches from the

Los Angeles Music Center The Los Angeles Music Center (officially the Performing Arts Center of Los Angeles County) is one of the largest performing arts centers in the United States. Located in downtown Los Angeles, The Music Center is composed of the Dorothy Chandler Pa ...

complex to

City Hall In local government, a city hall, town hall, civic centre (in the UK or Australia), guildhall, or municipal hall (in the Philippines) is the chief administrative building of a city, town, or other municipality. It usually houses the city o ...

. Now, the city looks to bring pedestrian life into the area. In March 2017, the Los Angeles City Council approved a new Civic Center Master Plan (CCMP). It details a full build out around city hall by the year 2032, specifically the east facing front. The CCMP schedules for a full tear down of Parker Center (torn down in 2019), L.A. City Hall's "south" building, and the

Los Angeles Mall The Los Angeles Mall is a small shopping center and series of plazas (public squares) at the Los Angeles Civic Center, between Main and Los Angeles Streets on the north and south sides of Temple Street, connected by both a pedestrian bridge ...

. The CCMP is to connect City Hall in a pedestrian-friendly way with its surrounding neighborhood and Little Tokyo. The CCMP calls for active ground-floor uses, to stimulate the pedestrian traffic that the Civic Center currently lacks. Four new government and office towers are described in the plan as well as the planned Park 101 recreational area. A design approach idea to cover U.S. Highway 101 as a trench with green space above. Connecting with

Union Station A union station, union terminal, joint station, or joint-use station is a railway station at which the tracks and facilities are shared by two or more separate railway company, railway companies, allowing passengers to connect conveniently bet ...

and

Olvera Street Olvera Street, commonly known by its Spanish language, Spanish name Calle Olvera, is a historic pedestrian street in El Pueblo de Los Ángeles Historical Monument, El Pueblo de Los Ángeles, the historic center of Los Angeles. The street is loc ...

Buildings and landmarks

traverses an east–west axis from Hope to Spring streets. West side of Figueroa between Temple and First: * County depts. of

Public Health Public health is "the science and art of preventing disease, prolonging life and promoting health through the organized efforts and informed choices of society, organizations, public and private, communities and individuals". Analyzing the de ...

and

Health Services Health care, or healthcare, is the improvement or maintenance of health via the preventive healthcare, prevention, diagnosis, therapy, treatment, wikt:amelioration, amelioration or cure of disease, illness, injury, and other disability, physic ...

* Figueroa Plaza, various city departments Between Figueroa and Hope: *

John Ferraro John Ferraro (May 14, 1924 – April 17, 2001) was an American politician and businessman who was a Democratic member of the Los Angeles City Council from 1966 until his death in 2001, the longest tenure of any member in the city's history. Bef ...

Building housing the

Los Angeles Department of Water and Power The Los Angeles Department of Water and Power (LADWP) is the largest municipal Public utility, utility in the United States with 8,100 megawatts of electric generating capacity (2021–2022) and delivering an average of 435 million gallons of wat ...

(DWP) Between Hope and Grand: *

Ahmanson Theatre The Ahmanson Theatre is one of the four main venues that compose the Los Angeles Music Center. Shows at this theater are produced by Center Theatre Group. History The theatre was built as a result of a donation from Howard F. Ahmanson Sr, the ...

and

Mark Taper Forum The Mark Taper Forum is a 739-seat thrust stage at the Los Angeles Music Center designed by Welton Becket and Associates on the Bunker Hill section of downtown Los Angeles. Named for real estate developer Mark Taper, the Forum, the neighborin ...

(1967) *

and

(1964) *

Between Grand and Hill: *

Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels The Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels (), informally known as the COLA or the Los Angeles Cathedral (), is the metropolitan cathedral of the Roman Catholic Church in Los Angeles, California, United States. It opened in 2002 and serves as the mo ...

(2002,

Rafael Moneo José Rafael Moneo Vallés (born 9 May 1937) is a Spanish architect. He won the Pritzker Prize for architecture in 1996, the RIBA Royal Gold Medal in 2003, and La Biennale's Golden Lion in 2021. Biography Born in Tudela, Spain, Moneo studi ...

Modern architecture Modern architecture, also called modernist architecture, or the modern movement, is an architectural movement and style that was prominent in the 20th century, between the earlier Art Deco and later postmodern movements. Modern architectur ...

with

deconstructivist Deconstructivism is a postmodern architectural movement which appeared in the 1980s. It gives the impression of the fragmentation of the constructed building, commonly characterised by an absence of obvious harmony, continuity, or symmetry. ...

elements) *

(1958,

Late Moderne architecture Late Moderne is a phase of Moderne architecture as defined by the National Register of Historic Places. Style The Late Moderne style incorporates elements of both the Streamline Moderne and International architecture, International styles. The firs ...

) * Kenneth Hahn Hall of Administration (1960,

) Between Hill and Broadway: * Los Angeles County Hall of Records (1962) *

United States Courthouse Following is a list of United States federal courthouses, which will comprise all courthouses currently or formerly in use for the housing of United States federal courts. Each entry indicates the name of the building along with an image, if avai ...

(2016), built on the site of the demolished First Junipero Serra State Office Building ( Stanton & Stockwell, 1960) Between Broadway and Spring: * Hall of Justice (1925) *Site of California State Building (1931-1976, vacant) * Law Library *

Clara Shortridge Foltz Criminal Justice Center The Clara Shortridge Foltz Criminal Justice Center (formerly known as the Criminal Courts Building) is the county criminal courthouse in the Civic Center neighborhood of Los Angeles, California. It is located at 210 West Temple Street, between B ...

(1972) Between Spring and Main: * Spring St. U.S. Court House (1940) *

Los Angeles City Hall Los Angeles City Hall, completed in 1928, is the center of the government of the city of Los Angeles, California, and houses the Mayor of Los Angeles, mayor's office and the meeting chambers and offices of the Los Angeles City Council. It is loca ...

(1928) *

Los Angeles Police Department Headquarters The City of Los Angeles Police Department, commonly referred to as Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD), is the primary law enforcement agency of Los Angeles, California, United States. With 8,832 officers and 3,000 civilian staff, it is the th ...

(2009) Between Main and Los Angeles St.: *

( Stanton & Stockwell, 1974) **City Hall East **

Triforium A triforium is an interior Gallery (theatre), gallery, opening onto the tall central space of a building at an upper level. In a church, it opens onto the nave from above the side aisles; it may occur at the level of the clerestory windows, o ...

* City Hall South *

Caltrans District 7 Headquarters The Caltrans District 7 Headquarters building at 100 South Main Street in Downtown Los Angeles, California, United States serves the California Department of Transportation (Caltrans) and the Los Angeles Department of Transportation. Built on a ...

Between Los Angeles St. and Alameda: * Los Angeles Federal Building (1965, architect

Welton Becket Welton David Becket (August 8, 1902 – January 16, 1969) was an American modern architect who designed many buildings in Los Angeles, California. Biography Becket was born in Seattle, Washington and graduated from the University of Washingt ...

) * Edward R. Roybal Federal Building *Alameda Street Detention Facility * Parker Center (1955, former police HQ, vacant)

County representation

The

Los Angeles County Department of Health Services Health Services Los Angeles County, officially the Los Angeles County Department of Health Services, operates the public hospitals and clinics in Los Angeles County, California, Los Angeles County and is the United States' second largest municip ...

operates the Central Health Center in

, serving the Civic Center."

References

{{Los Angeles