Midtownkid wrote:
This is one of the most exciting important things to happen in KC for sometime! Glad it is happening while we are in a recession and nothing new is going up along Main (or is it?). Once the economy comes back and hopefully this thing passes, we too can see some new, better development!
I still can't believe they put that big suburban Home Depot on Main (and tore down Ray's Playpen ) That should never have happened in an urban location.
Midtownkid wrote:
This is one of the most exciting important things to happen in KC for sometime! Glad it is happening while we are in a recession and nothing new is going up along Main (or is it?). Once the economy comes back and hopefully this thing passes, we too can see some new, better development!
This should be timed well for the recession and hopefully the recovery. It goes into effect six months after it's approved, so end of October. Then developers will have six months where they can choose submit projects under the new code or the old code. At one year the new code becomes effective for all new development.
Also, any development that has already been approved will still fall under the old code, even if construction doesn't start until sometime in the future.
Midtownkid wrote:
Oh is the Rays building really gone now? It had been converted into a laundromat...but now it's gone? That's kind of sad...it was a cute-ish building.
Ray's was on the east side of Main, south of McDonalds & Miltons.
It moved to the west side of Main after the Home Depot demolition...
"I never quarrel, sir; but I do fight, sir; and when I fight, sir, a funeral follows, sir." -senator thomas hart benton
Speaking of car washes - did the assholes building the carwash on Main run out of money or something? I haven't checked it out for awhile but last I noticed it looked like the construction had pretty much been abandoned. I would think you would have wanted to have a car wash business open by early spring at the latest.
Sounds like the developer pissing and moaning is starting in earnest. Outhustled by the big, bad bicycling enthusiast lobby eh? Love the admonishment that developers need to make sure and get paper work filed for as many shit strip malls and drive throughs as they possibly can before summer.
Sounds like the developer pissing and moaning is starting in earnest. Outhustled by the big, bad bicycling enthusiast lobby eh? Love the admonishment that developers need to make sure and get paper work filed for as many shit strip malls and drive throughs as they possibly can before summer.
Of development professionals that I know, those who work in multiple cities, either regionally or nationally, have almost to a person offered that Kansas City is the most difficult city to work with/through in getting work approved and/or completed. And it's not like this extreme level of city control has resulted in a spectacularly well planned and executed city.
I've not read the new regulations, but I'm worried about what it really contains.
loftguy wrote:
Of development professionals that I know, those who work in multiple cities, either regionally or nationally, have almost to a person offered that Kansas City is the most difficult city to work with/through in getting work approved and/or completed. And it's not like this extreme level of city control has resulted in a spectacularly well planned and executed city.
I've not read the new regulations, but I'm worried about what it really contains.
Beurocracy and understaffing were problems before and will no doubt be problems after. But relaxed parking requirements in urban neighborhoods, restrictions against sidewalk fronting parking lots and set backs, allowances for pedestrians, restrictions against suburban style buildings in the urban core? These are things that should have been enacted 15 years ago.
Yea, there are a lot of things to bitch about in regards to KC municipal bureaucracy and regulation, but I have to think the grievances they raise here are pretty low on the list. Set-asides for bicycles? Buffers for waterways? Planting trees? I can't imagine these are going to be huge impediments to development.
Plain and simple, they are going to cost a few dollars to implement and owners will be a little more restricted in what they can do with their property in critical urban areas. Of course they are against it.
Keep in mind who is doing the bitching and moaning. Jim Bowers and the White Goss Bowers law firm specialize in representing companies that primarily build strip malls, McMansions, and garden apartments. Their clients feel threatened because they build exactly the type of stuff that the new code will curtail.
However, most of the opponents are Northland developers who won't be as impacted as companies like Block that specialize in urban strip malls. The Northland can continue building suburban-style stuff with only modest changes.
Opposition to the streamway buffers is amazing. The buffer is designed to protect development from flash flooding, yet some cling to the belief that any undeveloped land is wasted land.
dangerboy wrote:
...Opposition to the streamway buffers is amazing. The buffer is designed to protect development from flash flooding, yet some cling to the belief that any undeveloped land is wasted land.
just like the death panels will kill grandma, the new ordinance will simply push existing businesses in the buffer zone into the creek.
Haikus are easy
But sometimes they don't make sense
Refrigerator
It's being billed as a 21st century code intended to encourage a more green, urban and entrepreneurial Kansas City, while shedding some of the city's poor reputation as a place to do business.
City officials think it will shave several weeks from the approval process by reducing red tape. And it scraps 1950s-era clauses that discouraged mixed-use projects and forced smaller businesses to provide what is now considered excessive off-street parking.
The code has uniform requirements for landscaping, lighting, signage and how close developments can be built to streams and other waterways. It also reduces the amount of parking developers must provide for most projects, particularly if they're located near bus rapid transit stops.
And no dedicated parking will be required for new uses proposed within the central business district or for any historic renovation projects.
) That should never have happened in an urban location.
