Why So Many Legal Courts in S.F.?

Bay Curious

KQED

Places & Travel, Society & Culture, History

4.8 • 1.1K Ratings

🗓️ 9 March 2026

⏱️ 17 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Longtime listener Henry Lie was driving through San Francisco one day when he realized the staggering number of legal courts located in the heart of the city. Upon further investigation, he realized we had all levels of court on the state side, and all except the U.S. Supreme Court on the federal side. Wowsa! How did so many end up here? KQED's Molly Lacob takes us through some legal history. Additional Resources: Read the transcript for this episode Sign up for our newsletter Got a question you want answered? Ask! Your support makes KQED podcasts possible. You can show your love by going to https://kqed.org/donate/podcasts This story was reported by Molly Lacob. Bay Curious is made by Katrina Schwartz, Christopher Beale and Olivia Allen-Price. Additional support from Jen Chien, Katie Sprenger, Maha Sanad, Ethan Toven-Lindsey and everyone on Team KQED. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:42.2	Hello, I'm Olivia Allen Price, and this is Bay Curious.
0:46.1	A few weeks ago, I hopped on a video call with our question asker.
0:49.7	My name's Henry Lee.
0:51.1	I'm from Pacifica, California in San Mateo County. And yeah, I'm an avid listener of Big Curious.
0:59.6	And he was really quite dressed up.
1:01.7	Yeah, I was coming from a job interview. So.
1:03.9	Oh, I was excited. Did you put the tie on for me?
1:06.6	Yeah, just for you.
1:07.8	Henry's getting a master's degree in urban planning. And what became apparent as we spoke is he sees the city in a way that most people might not.
1:16.9	He just notices things.
1:18.9	And not too long ago, he was making his way through San Francisco.
1:23.5	I was driving on Van Nuys one day.
	...

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