KCRag Forum

DaveKCMO wrote:

WoodDraw wrote:Couldn't they make the money by charging for parking? Or at least a reasonable amount? Like, why free?

Garages aren't profitable because of the initial cost + operating overhead. That's why they're often incentivized, municipally owned/managed, or dedicated to one user who can cover the losses.

Here's the city manager's response to how it would be paid for (sort of a non-answer): https://twitter.com/KCMOManager/status/ ... 2156352513

Thanks

I guess I'm still stuck on the free part. I won't pretend to be an expert on the the economics of parking garages, but I hope this gets due diligence.

kcjak wrote:

flyingember wrote:

kcjak wrote:It was just a rudimentary calculation whith no time to sit and do all of the math. No need to be a dick about it but thanks for figuring it out to the last 70 cents.

Should never have to sit down and figure numbers when there's free spreadsheet software available to do it for you.

Enter $250k in A1, enter =A1*1.05 in A2 and fill down to row 25. Then use sum in A26 to get the total.
Takes 20 seconds.

I don't comment on here a lot, and this shitty, condescending attitude is why. No wonder fewer and fewer people are joining or commenting.

I don't spend a lot a time on posting on other forums but this is probably the only forum that I've ever posted on where forumers generally respect each other's viewpoints. Most forums have a host of people that are pretty despicable and embarrassments to whatever cause the forum is there to further.

WoodDraw wrote:Couldn't they make the money by charging for parking? Or at least a reasonable amount? Like, why free?

People here get it, but I hope city hall does too. The last thing downtown KC needs is free parking in a new garage. KC people need to understand that it cost (even if only a little by large city standards) to park in urban areas.

DaveKCMO wrote:

WoodDraw wrote:Couldn't they make the money by charging for parking? Or at least a reasonable amount? Like, why free?

Garages aren't profitable because of the initial cost + operating overhead. That's why they're often incentivized, municipally owned/managed, or dedicated to one user who can cover the losses.

Here's the city manager's response to how it would be paid for (sort of a non-answer): https://twitter.com/KCMOManager/status/ ... 2156352513

One of Troy's staff followed up and suggested that free parking wasn't really a policy goal, so hopefully that part of this deal dies quickly.

I'm more concerned that they THINK Corrigan is free.

Wait is that for real?

From City Scene KC:

https://cityscenekc.com/proposed-office ... lis-plaza/

Another angle:



That's a really nice looking building. Don't love the garage portion, but the office and the side facing BAP looks great. I hope it actually gets built like this.

I'm glad it's not just a garage with an office building plopped on top. Seems really well thought out

^Agree, especially since only one side of garage partially faces street and other an alley. A back corner garage with alley access would be even better but this is pretty good, might not be doable if alley too narrow. A taller building would also be nicer but at least there is speculative space being built (appears to be) and that's pretty good infill of a surface lot. Maybe if a large tenant is interested it could end up a bit taller. But alas, this is just a proposal, so....

riiiiight... I'll believe this one when it's topped out and glass is going in. I've learned not to get my hopes up for new projects.

If they're building office space on spec, I'll forgive most of my complaints here.

Does anyone know these people? Do they have the ability to finance three projects in KC?

The blank wall at steet level isn’t great but otherwise... yeah, build that.

I love the design of this office building/garage, and the project as a whole. I'm assuming they selected the former KC Club building as the hotel, vs. the Muelbach, due to the extensive event/amenity spaces, which they recently heavily rehabbed (the Brass on Broadway space is gorgeous). Also, it sounds like the developer has experience with former city club to hotel conversions with the Chicago Athletic Club Hotel - nice.

I feel fairly optimistic about the office piece - the entire project is surely contingent on the garage providing the necessary parking for both hotel and apartment components. Some type of structured parking will be built on that lot; hopefully between the city holding their ground on the office space suggestion (and related incentives) and the recent success of Corrigan, we'll see this move forward sooner than later.

Incredible design on that. This is one developer that KC needs to cherish and keep around. They did a stunning job wrapping up that garage with office space. Everything about this project is just awesome and it looks like it has a very good chance of actually happening.

My only complaint is the street level could be better and parking. But if this is legit, we need these type of developers. The design looks great.

It could be possible to move garage to back side with a wider alley sort of extended into property and upper building sort of extended over part of the alley. Would need to be wide enough to allow cars both directions to rear garage entrance/exit, so could be more complicated to pull off. But I do like the way the garage is sort of in one quadrant. Better than most other designs that have purely all surrounding ground level garage. Should become a precedent to set for other downtown office buildings if not able to do back alley garage entrance/exits.

The wanting city help for free parking is less than awesome (it's actually quite bad) but the design is great.

KCPowercat wrote:The wanting city help for free parking is less than awesome (it's actually quite bad) but the design is great.

Well, the free parking is stupid, that's for sure. I just think the overall design is pretty good. They could have easily just stuck a 3 story building on top of a garage and done this entire project in about half the height. It looks like there is a lot of finished interior space that is for architecture and aesthetics only. The leasable office space looks like it's only on the top three floors. Most of that space that wraps around the garage looks like public atriums etc. I'm sure it will turn out very different if built. But yeah, the city should make it known that free public parking is not a priority. I'm not even sure the surrounding hotels would be thrilled with a free parking option guests could take advantage of when they probably charge $20 a night.

Could the free parking in this garage be used to help free up some of the parking costs associated with the BAP garage project?