All the cities of Virginia are independent cities. Therefore, Fairfax City Hall was the place for me. I haven’t seen a lot of city halls, so I have little experience or room for judgment about them. But of the few I’ve seen, I don’t think I’ve seen a complex similar to this one. Usually, when you see a building of a lower level of government in competition with one of a higher level, the lower level is much less impressive in comparison. There are exceptions: the Denver City Hall looks on par with their capitol. Yet this one almost seems courthouse-like or of similar stature. Something about being a county equivalent, I guess. So, credit to Fairfax where credit is due. I was also sweating a little when I got here. We all pulled in a few blocks away at a cache, and I ran up the street to do my photographic work as they stayed and found the cache.
It was simple enough: an electrical plate on an iron fence. It was camouflaged just well enough that it took a couple of minutes to find in the dark, but being the clever and resourceful cachers we are, we managed. With our quarry found, we mounted back up, heading to …
Geocaching While Black 
How is it that I am 73 years old; have taken multiple courses in World History, US History, and California History; and have never before heard of this concept of Independent Cities?
The US education system really is problematic.
Anyway, your post drove me off to the Font of All Human Knowledge, i.e., Wikipedia, where I learned all kinds of things I had not known before. See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Independent_city
I have lived most of my life in California, so I knew about the City and County of San Francisco. And, even knew about the Counties and Burroughs of New York City. But, I did not know that New York County and the Borough of Manhattan were one and the same.
And that helped explain a point I had always wondered about in a Law and Order episode. Jack McCoy offered a witness immunity for his testimony against another defendant. And, as soon as the fellow testified and walked out of the courtroom there were officers from another borough there to arrest him. Naturally, he protested that he had immunity. And, Jack McCoy responds that he granted immunity in the County of New York, but that does not stop other counties from moving against you.
Finally, the Fairfax City Hall IS gorgeous. We used to have a gorgeous courthouse like that in my city too. But, earthquakes. I suspect from his posts that atreides78723 would not approve of the modern replacement any more than I do. It is functional. That is about all that you can say for it.
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To be fair, if you’re American and don’t live in Virginia, Maryland, Missouri, or Nevada, independent cities don’t really apply to you.
I also try not to judge crappy courthouses that are the result of rebuilding after disaster. When I was in Rockport many years ago, their courthouse had been destroyed by a hurricane so they were using half a strip mall until the new one was complete. I had to bite my tongue really hard that day…
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