Kc skyscraper drought about to max depression era droughttt.

[normalthings]

Not sure how large you consider H&R Block but that would be the only large firm I can think of that has moved to downtown in the last 25 years. But that move was only from the fringe of the Plaza so for the city as a whole it wasn't that beneficial. Plus wasn't there plans for a second tower for the company that is on hold for now?
The Bannister complex was just about empty when its closure was announced so not that many employees were involved. Of course there was hope a few years ago of a new federal building but unless there is a new federal infrastructure program that comes into existence that hope will be long term given the current attempt to reduce federal employment.
This is probably contrarian but downtown KC's best hope is to try to latch on to a growing small or medium sized company or two or three or more and hope one or two of them continue to grow into a large company.

Cordish, The City, HR, and Copaken are all in talks about building the second HR Block tower.

[WoodDraw]

Not sure how large you consider H&R Block but that would be the only large firm I can think of that has moved to downtown in the last 25 years. But that move was only from the fringe of the Plaza so for the city as a whole it wasn't that beneficial. Plus wasn't there plans for a second tower for the company that is on hold for now?
The Bannister complex was just about empty when its closure was announced so not that many employees were involved. Of course there was hope a few years ago of a new federal building but unless there is a new federal infrastructure program that comes into existence that hope will be long term given the current attempt to reduce federal employment.
This is probably contrarian but downtown KC's best hope is to try to latch on to a growing small or medium sized company or two or three or more and hope one or two of them continue to grow into a large company.

Cordish, The City, HR, and Copaken are all in talks about building the second HR Block tower.

What's Copaken have to do with it? Finding a tenant?

[WoodDraw]

Copaken for the longest time had a vaporware rendering plastered on their site north of the Sprint center. Is that still there? They are such a frustrating company.

[hartliss]

It’s going to be hard to lure big companies when there is no avalible or soon to be available or really any substantial “in the pipeline” office space.

But it’s also hard to build any office space without companies already being interested in it.(spec is hard)

We need spec. Office Space in more mixed use projects.

This. But KC lacks developers that would put up urban spec space. KC has not had any such developers since the Morgan empire in the 1980's. Had it not been for them, the Commerce Tower would probably still be the largest structure in the skyline.

KC biggest companies are not interested in downtown. There will never be a 50 story Sprint or Cerner tower, so building spec and heaving some ready to move in modern office space is really the only option and KC's developers are just too conservative. Waiting for the vacancy rate to drop to 5% will take generations. It is what it is I guess.

I really enjoy this thread and everyone's input. I agree with a lot of the points being made. Thought I would play off the quoted with my perspective:

To Grid's point, we don't have any developers who would take that type of risk (spec) when compared to other cities (i.e. Detroit and Hudson's Site http://www.hudsonssitedetroit.com, Dan Gilbert's dev arm (quicken founder)). Plus KC's economy isn't Nashville or Austin where more companies and/or developers may be willing to strike while the market is hot and move DT.

Think about some of the prominent KC developers, Block, Copaken, VanTrust. They are great at sitting on vacant land or developing the safest bets (Plaza, OP, etc). I am not sure if it is conservative mindset or lack of institutional investors willing to hedge their bets.

To Grid's other point, there isn't that civic pride/downtown mindset when it comes to KC's big companies. I am not sure if it is a deeply rooted mindset or that the state-line makes it easy to jump to South OP next to the CEO's 5 bedroom house or what. The last "jump" was HRB to downtown which was full of incentives from the city to do so.

[GRID]

^

Again, I hope people don't think I'm being a downer. I think people in KC should be excited about all the development that's happening, but at the same time, I hope they realize that every city in the country is doing at least as much as KC is doing as far as residential, but I'm not sure there is another example of a city that has struggled as much as KC when it comes to downtown corporate investment. Maybe St Louis I guess, but then they have Clayton which has seen a lot more action than Downtown KC/Plaza.

What about San Jose, with all the Tech that has boomed in that region, San Jose should have a skyline that rivals hong kong

Not sure what you mean. Downtown SJ has boomed quite a bit and there are some big companies there. They don't have a skyline because they are at the end of a major airport so they have a height restriction.

[GRID]

Copaken for the longest time had a vaporware rendering plastered on their site north of the Sprint center. Is that still there? They are such a frustrating company.

Copaken still has renderings for the site next to Denny's and a super old rendering from the late 1980's for the parking structure south of the transit center on Main. That site next to the Spring Center should be at least a 600,000 sq ft tower. That's the best spot for a large new office tower in the city. But it will stay a parking lot probably for eternity.

KC has always needed some new developers. In the 80's office towers were going up without tenants and they eventually filled up. It's so much easier to bring in an out of town company when you have ready to move in brand new office space. You have to have developers that can sit on a mostly empty building for a short time though and Copaken just won't do that.

That's why whenever you have a chance to build new office space, even if it means emptying out an older building you do it. It's always better in the long run. It's the opposite in retail (although metro KC does that wrong too by building new retail when there is plenty of existing empty space).

[Highlander]

It’s going to be hard to lure big companies when there is no avalible or soon to be available or really any substantial “in the pipeline” office space.

But it’s also hard to build any office space without companies already being interested in it.(spec is hard)

We need spec. Office Space in more mixed use projects.

This. But KC lacks developers that would put up urban spec space. KC has not had any such developers since the Morgan empire in the 1980's. Had it not been for them, the Commerce Tower would probably still be the largest structure in the skyline.

KC biggest companies are not interested in downtown. There will never be a 50 story Sprint or Cerner tower, so building spec and heaving some ready to move in modern office space is really the only option and KC's developers are just too conservative. Waiting for the vacancy rate to drop to 5% will take generations. It is what it is I guess.

I really enjoy this thread and everyone's input. I agree with a lot of the points being made. Thought I would play off the quoted with my perspective:

To Grid's point, we don't have any developers who would take that type of risk (spec) when compared to other cities (i.e. Detroit and Hudson's Site http://www.hudsonssitedetroit.com, Dan Gilbert's dev arm (quicken founder)). Plus KC's economy isn't Nashville or Austin where more companies and/or developers may be willing to strike while the market is hot and move DT.

Think about some of the prominent KC developers, Block, Copaken, VanTrust. They are great at sitting on vacant land or developing the safest bets (Plaza, OP, etc). I am not sure if it is conservative mindset or lack of institutional investors willing to hedge their bets.

To Grid's other point, there isn't that civic pride/downtown mindset when it comes to KC's big companies. I am not sure if it is a deeply rooted mindset or that the state-line makes it easy to jump to South OP next to the CEO's 5 bedroom house or what. The last "jump" was HRB to downtown which was full of incentives from the city to do so.

There have been several companies that have moved downtown from other parts of the metro since HRB but they've just been relatively small. But once in place, if successful, they grow. Some have even moved from Johnson county. One thing downtown has to offer is that it is a better location for attracting young talent. While I do think that the housing market in Johnson County is a draw for some companies, downtown is more and more becoming an attractive address - like the Plaza has been especially with tech companies with younger work forces. Large companies probably see downtown as somewhat of an impediment due to the expense of building parking garages - these are the things that TIFs should really be used for.

[KCPowercat]

Important to remember we all tend to judge KC on a higher standard than we would other cities our size where we don't live and have as vested of an interest in....go ask other city nerds from other cities what they think KCs trajectory is and you will get a way different picture.

[GRID]

To Grid's other point, there isn't that civic pride/downtown mindset when it comes to KC's big companies. I am not sure if it is a deeply rooted mindset or that the state-line makes it easy to jump to South OP next to the CEO's 5 bedroom house or what. The last "jump" was HRB to downtown which was full of incentives from the city to do so.

I really don't think it's proximity to where the CEO's live. First off, there are some very upscale housing developments in the Northland for new CEO's to live if they were to move a company from out of town to downtown or if a CEO realy wanted to be close to the office, I would think they would just relocate to the Northland where they are much closer to KCI too. CEO's travel a lot, so if they really were worried about driving, why would they choose to live so far from the airport?

I think it comes down to two major things.

Kansas and the incentives war. KCMO/MO just can't or won't consistently compete with KS when it comes to incentives.

The lack of major HQ in the city. KC has become a very regional or local office town, so it lacks the big fortune 100 or even 500 companies that tend to be the most committed to big high profile civic type projects.

Hallmark is really the only company KC has like that and their best days are in the past.

[GRID]

Important to remember we all tend to judge KC on a higher standard than we would other cities our size where we don't live and have as vested of an interest in....go ask other city nerds from other cities what they think KCs trajectory is and you will get a way different picture.

I would actually consider KC to be a peer to Baltimore and because I follow Baltimore closely I will say this. KC is way better than Baltimore in many ways. Baltimore has some major problems too, they are just different than KC's problems.

But one thing about Baltimore is that they have a lot of corporations that have a lot of civic passion. And this is in a city with a lot more problems than KC (crime, corruption etc). Companies want to be in the city and just keep trying to make it work and for the most part it does work. There are several office tower projects in the works with a few recently completed.

KC companies are like nowhere to be found when it comes to downtown. It's like they are not even in the same region.

[KCPowercat]

The new generation of "KC pride" and renewed urban life is really still in its infancy....locations of offices take time to shift.

[WoodDraw]

I think that was a shot at Cerner and them basically saying they wanted a massive parking lot on a highway to drive to from loch lloyd.

[KCPowercat]

Let's hope every interview Cerner does with anybody living or wanting to live downtown, the topic of their office location is brought up as a huge negative.

[ULCajun]

Let's hope every interview Cerner does with anybody living or wanting to live downtown, the topic of their office location is brought up as a huge negative.

Was the #1 point of my exit interview in 2015 after they announced the new campus. I don't think they are listening

[normalthings]

Let's hope every interview Cerner does with anybody living or wanting to live downtown, the topic of their office location is brought up as a huge negative.

Was the #1 point of my exit interview in 2015 after they announced the new campus. I don't think they are listening

Maybe the new CEO will have a different mind set?
I recently interviewed w/ a couple young Cerner employees. All live downtown. None of them KC natives, all love KC tho, good chunk leaving because they want the “walkable live,play,work” lifestyle(or whatever you wanna call it).

Edit: Actual Interview was not related to Cerner. It just came up in discussion.

[GRID]

Cerner is strung all over the metro. You often have to drive through downtown to get from one of their campuses to the other.

It would make so much sense to build a single signature 40-60 story tower of 500,000 to 1 million sq ft and throw their name on it and make a huge impact on the city and their brand. It would be so much easier to impress clients and potential employees etc. They could put all their top HQ stuff in there like the CEOs, the human resources, recruiting and marketing departments and fill the rest up with the highest paid most experienced workers. Then employees that start off at the campuses can work towards one of those jobs "downtown".

A single tower could be done just be reducing the Bannister complex by a few buildings.

Just saying. Wow, not sure why I'm posting so much here lately haha.

[FangKC]

I wouldn't criticize Cerner's campus at the Bannister location if their proposed plan included building a lot of dense residential around their office buildings, and many of their employees could live near work. Or at least set aside parcels for developers to do this. It would be very easy to build out apartment buildings to handle 2000 employees onsite, or in biking distance. Cerner could finance these buildings and have employees' rent cover the building mortgages, or they could simply plan for parcels, or finished apartment buildings, to sell to developers.

Doing this would be to their advantage, because many employees would have a reduced commute time. There would be less traffic on the highways around their campus. The cluster of housing would support retail and services. Having more housing nearby would increase the value of Cerner's real estate there.

[GRID]

^ There was a story in the Biz Journal last week I think, mentioning that there is a lot of interest in new residential construction near near the Bannister Campus. Apparently there is a lot of interest in several sites, but the one just east of the core of the campus east of Hillcrest that is likely to be developed soon into a large apartment development. There are is also a project in the works over at the SW corner of 435 and Bannister that will be new apartments.

[FangKC]

Yes, I saw that. But that is a case of developers maybe coming in and developing properties in the area. I'm talking about all the land under the Cerner campus footprint, where they could create a walkable neighborhood instead of a sea of surface parking. I cited housing for about 2000 employees onsite. It wouldn't be that hard to place 8 apartment complexes about the size of Summit on Quality Hill (252 units) around the headquarters buildings. they could line the artery roads. Some could be placed along the edge next to I-435. Place some others on the east perimeter along the railroad.

I'm not talking about building 10 or 20-story residential towers. You could get by with several 5-story buildings. I'm being conservative here. If I were the Grand Poohba of Cerner, I'd create a more dense mix of office and residential along those artery streets and build in more parking garages (hidden from sight) instead of surface lots.

[GRID]

Everybody that has an ounce of urban planning knowledge (from this decade) have been saying all along that the project needs to include residential in a way more like your graphics. But it's not going to happen. Not with Cerner running the show. It looks like the best thing that will come from this project is a couple of apartment complexes around the perimeter and I won't even believe that till it happens.