On-going downtown development projects

[pash]

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[aknowledgeableperson]

"Downtown KC has roughly half as many structured parking spaces as all of Manhattan south of the park."

So?????????????????
Not an accurate comparison because of the number workers living nearby and/or use mass transit to get to work. Doubt if KC ever gets away from car driving or have sufficient numbers using mass transit in the foreseeable future.

[pash]

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[FangKC]

Yes, the problem is that workers want to park a few yards away from the entrance to their workplace. No one thinks they can walk more than two blocks anymore. That's why we have an obesity problem in this country, because we have designed passive exercise out of people's lives. I used to walk 10 blocks to work each morning, and back in the evening--not counting 8 blocks back and forth from my office to the hospital--sometimes several times a day. In NYC, it's very common for auxiliary offices to be several blocks from your main employer. The institution where I worked rented office space all over the neighborhood, and it was often the case where your office was several blocks away from the main campus.

I cede the point about most people working in downtown buildings will probably be driving in from the suburbs or distant neighborhoods in KCMO. Too many neighborhoods don't even have bus service close by. So most people might not have that option. It will be this way for the foreseeable future because that is how we have built up the Metro. My preference however would be for those garages to get built in less dense areas of downtown that are less desirable locations for other things--up against freeways, odd parcels in the West Bottoms and Paseo West against I-70, even over the freeways. Then people park there, and take mass transit the rest of the way--streetcar, bus, walk. In that situation, it might be time to bring back the KCATA circulator bus which takes people back and forth to the garage locations. I certainly don't want to see anymore buildings torn down for parking.

The other thing I would like see with any new garages being built in the future is that they are designed so they can be converted into office or residential space if the time ever comes that they aren't needed. Of course, it's hard to do that will a massive garage that takes up an entire block, and they have the slanted parking decks. The roof heights tend not to be high enough for later conversion, so that would have to be considered. But with smaller garages it need not be such a problem.

[LCDSI]

fyi; nice rendering and upcoming announcement of an 800 room hotel.

http://www.kansascity.com/news/business ... 56897.html

[flyingember]

fyi; nice rendering and upcoming announcement of an 800 room hotel.

http://www.kansascity.com/news/business ... 56897.html

See here http://kcrag.com/viewtopic.php?f=15&t=18949

[kboish]

When Cordish was discussing their plans for two light they talked about how excited they were with the possibility that next year there may be as many as 5 cranes building new towers on the KC skyline. What 5 can we come up with? Do we assume its 10-12+ stories? I'm assuming one light will be done.

Hyatt Hotel- 22 stories (maybe 40? )
Two Light- 25 stories
ARTerra - 12 stories
Hotel- 12 stories (Can't remember what this is called, but its next to proposed Hyatt)

The last several projects are smaller in height and may or may not have big tower cranes- Main St. Hotel; Crossroads West apartments; and dare I say UMKC Conservatory? There are probably more possibilities I'm not thinking of.

All but one of these high rise, new construction projects are in the Xroads.

EDIT: and i should add that all of these projects are replacing surface parking- or at least mostly surface parking.

[longviewmo]

Hotel- 12 stories (Can't remember what this is called, but its next to proposed Hyatt)

Not the Residence Inn/Courtyard that's supposed to be done this fall?

[kboish]

Hotel- 12 stories (Can't remember what this is called, but its next to proposed Hyatt)

Not the Residence Inn/Courtyard that's supposed to be done this fall?

I didn't realize that was supposed to be done this fall. I guess it will rise pretty quick over the next several months.

Well then, what else?

[KCTOGA]

How about the Copaken Twisty Tower? Just north of Sprint Center.

[missingkc]

Power and Light building new construction on Baltimore

[flyingember]

How about the Copaken Twisty Tower? Just north of Sprint Center.

Not even close to being built.

[earthling]

Miscellaneous tidbits on downtown projects...
http://metrowiremedia.com/copaken-brook ... an-center/

Broadway UMKC plan... A rooftop band shell with lawn would be cool...


Alternate plan...


Time for a downtown City Target??

[pash]

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[Eon Blue]

The construction work on 20th right now is subsurface work that has to be done before the streetscape can go in.

[joshmv]

There's no good place to post this type of thing but Zane Burke (president of cerner) just bought most of the top floor of Wallstreet Tower. Admittedly a pretty worthless tidbit, but I thought you guys might find it interesting since we all hope they increase their presence downtown at some point even with Bannister going on.

[normalthings]

Another bit of random news, last day to nominate CEO's/companies for "Letters to CEO's "http://www.letterstoceos.com/#vote

Top Nominated CEO's/ Companies will be target of a letter righting campaign to woo companies to come to Downtown KC. http://goo.gl/exJ6gS

[earthling]

There's no good place to post this type of thing but Zane Burke (president of cerner) just bought most of the top floor of Wallstreet Tower. Admittedly a pretty worthless tidbit, but I thought you guys might find it interesting since we all hope they increase their presence downtown at some point even with Bannister going on.

Not worthless at all. This could influence Cerner to consider renting downtown space while the campus is built and even have permanent presence after complete.

[DaveKCMO]

http://www.kansascity.com/news/business ... 12055.html

Today, there are about 3,450 hotel rooms in Kansas City’s downtown, Crossroads and Crown Center areas. Two years from now, there could be more than 4,600, and that’s not counting the proposed 800-room convention center hotel tower.

[earthling]

While this helps a lot, is still pretty low for conventions and while midtown/Plaza has a lot of rooms, convention planners look at walking distance so Crown Center rooms barely qualify. Free streetcar will help include CC as basically within walking distance. Perhaps offer free MAX passes to conventioneers to Plaza?

Will be interesting to see if the growth of downtown rooms impacts rest of metro area hotels. KC metro has above avg room count for its size, something like 33K-35K rooms, about same as STL. But downtown KC below avg for its size and developers are finally responding.