Diamond Pearson’s survival was needed to survive a new place and was looking for something with an art feeling. V. He was interested in Liberty Crest Apartments in Fairfax County when he came into his online search.
“I tested it and fell in love – brick, concrete floor – it was very nice,” Mrs. Pyrson, 32 -year -old working at Fairfax County Schools, said. Each unit of the complex is unique, and he liked it too. He said someone who had not signed the lease agreement that someone said, “Do you know this is an old prison?”
In fact, now the Lorton Reformary of Development, known as Liberty, was a former life, Washington, a prison prison in DC, was built in the 5th, it was most commonly known for a few dozen victims captured in harsh and violent circumstances – including strict and violent situations. Was – feeding – after they pick out outside the White House.
Prison Closed in 2001And next year Fairfax County bought a 2,400 acre site, which included a farm and work area where the prisoners could learn business like metal at $ 4.2 million. County slowly turns the property into a park and golf course, three schools and an arts center. On the 21st, the County Selleblocks and other buildings began working with Alexander Company, a Wisconsin, efficiently to convert and create new structures and to create new structures. The complex now includes 165 apartments, of which 98 percent of the lease is given; 157 Town Homes; And 24 single-family home, as well as commercial space. In 2017, the tenants began to move, many swimming pools, 24 hours of gym and yoga rooms were attracted by facilities.
The first night in his new place was the most difficult, Mrs. Pearson said, who has been in her apartment with her son Britain and dog, Nike since 2022. “It was a bit drunk – I thought ‘Wow! “
Fairfax County, Alexander Agency and Elm Street Development – worked closely with members of the community during the planning process. Local residents have pressured for mixed-income accommodation and developers have confirmed that about a quarter of units have made 50 percent of the middle income people affordable. Market-rate, two bedroom apartments are $ 1,600 to $ 2,500, which is almost average in this region.
Members of the community also wanted to maintain the character of the site. Built during the progressive era, focusing on rehabilitation, the prison’s colon pneumoning buildings use bricks made on the site during the tent until the structures are completed. Maintaining that character was also a priority for the developers, in the section to take advantage of tax credit provided on historic Tihasik sites.
The renewal site includes a museum in the past, as well as the property of the prison, as well as the property of the property. Lucy Burns, who was imprisoned in Lorton, was named for Lucy Burns, showing the farming used by the primary prisoners as well as home -made weapons.
“I think they have done a good work to keep the historic tihassism and the integrity of the original design and intention,” said Lin Garve-Haj, a resident of Fairfax, the Fairfax History Commission. “I’m very satisfied with it.”
The renewal of the Lorton Reformatory has become an example for cities across the country because the growing number of states has been selected to close their prisons.
In the last decade of the twentieth century, the United States of America has experienced a prison-building boom; More than one thousand facilities were built from 19709 to 20. 2010However, the number of prisoners in the prison began to decline, due to partial punishment reforms and some drug -related crimes. About 200 State and Federal Correction facilities are off from 2000 to 2022.
In the New York State alone, the prisoner population has declined more 50 percent from 1999The In November, two corrective facilities were closed in Sullivan and Washington County in New York. These organizations joined the state 24 prisons that have stopped operations in the last 13 years. Some of them are being re -used in a way that will benefit their community, but many are still empty.
Success stories include Warwick, NY, New Jersey border near the border, where the municipality leads the government to change the attempt Mid-orange In a business campus and sports park. In Manhattan, former Lincoln Correction facility has been set as an affordable housing complex Called Seneca. And fiskil, in The Hudson Valley, Konifer Realty recently bought Downstate Correction Facility Site, a 100 acres of property It was closed in 2022. The company plans to turn the complex into a mixed use of mixed with houses.
But New York’s Liberty and Complex are in some of the most populous regions of the country. There are many detention centers in the rural region, where most US prisons were built in the last half century, there are no accepters. Local government officials are hopeful that these benefits will often bring jobs to the area. But when these detention centers, sometimes miles away from any lively economic activity, are abandoned, companies often do not line up to open their business there.
“There is a lack of awareness that the future of the prison outside the prison may be the imagination of what could be converted to a closed prison site,” Nicole Porter, a senior director of a non -profit project, said, “Senior director of a non -profit project, a non -profit organization, a non -profit. Promotes fairness.
The Mrs. Porters Group, which presses to reduce the imprisonment, supports the benefits of the benefits so that they can never be used as prison.
Old prisons are often close to the city centers, making them better candidates for renewal. However, in some cities, including Dallas, Indianapolis, Nashville and Pittsburg, there are empty complexes as prison renewal can be expensive, Mrs. Porter said.
The prison walls are thicker, they make it expensive to reform. Or, in the case of Nashville’s Tennessee State Prison, the structure-like structure-like structure built by architect Samuel Patton in -1898 may be full of asbestos.
And these sites are required to renew-mixed-owned mixed users or residential projects, or the local-private effort-resident residents, requires resources and busyness of many parties.
The involvement of the community means that some plans can never come down from the ground, as in Maine, Thomston, such as 15 acres of plot, such as the Maine State Jail, is still empty two decades after the jail closed because the residents have failed to agree to the property.
Despite the obstacles, officials know that renewable former prison sites can be catalyst for communities. In New York, Governor Kathy Huchul has created a Renewal commission To re -use the shutter sites in 2022.
In UTA, a 600 -acre site in a closed prison is renewing local companies with the Lincoln Property Agency and the State Government. The Uta State Jail was 70 years ago in Saltlake City 20 miles south of the rural region. The region has grown around it and today the property is in the most populous region of the state.
About a decade ago, an economic study highlighted the strategic value of the prison, so the state built a new jail in the west of the city and formed a land authority to rebuild the old property.
Most parts of the site were destroyed. The plan is named to turn it into a huge, dense development PointWhich will take at least 15 years to complete. The state will own the land and the process of making thousands of housing units and a railway station and bike trail is guiding it to connect it to the rest of the region.
The property is near the universities and the rapidly growing technology sector of Utah; There will also be an innovation district in this development, whose target research institutes and agencies are united with closeness. UTA Governor, Spencer J. Cox and Legislative Leaders Breaking the soil On the project in December.
As the Utah jail operates, the leaders of Michigan City, India, are watching. They too have been scheduled to close a state prison within a few years that occupies a original land. The renewal of the Indiana Duns National Park and about a mile away from Michigan Lake can unlock a new future for the city, which has decreased over the years but has recently begun to grow.
But first, the city has to control the property from the state – something that can be difficult. And then there are questions in the history of the prison. “They execute the site; They have long been, “Michigan City, an architect who is helping in his plan, says Doug Far. “Somewhere in this complex, there is a chair or something like that” “
It would be difficult to determine how to be respected by a death penalty, Mr. Farm said. But it will be a few years before the development ends and “we are counting over a period of time,” he said. “Perhaps people will be separated from their memories at that moment.”
