OFFICIAL - Prairiefire

[KCMax]

absolutely, that's what angers me the most.  These private developers using these half assed "cultural amenities" as a way to sugar coat what is an otherwise unnecessary and unworthy project (in terms of getting public subsidies).

No doubt STAR bonds need to be reformed. Its getting ridiculous.

On another note though, there is nothing preventing KC from building their own Natural History Museum. I wouldn't be surprised to see KC rush and make a half-assed attempt to build one now like they did an aquarium when Mission announced plans to build one.

[LenexatoKCMO]

YOU CALL this a freaking BURDEN, an AMENITY?

Build a fucking attraction with public money.  A REAL attraction.  A bottanical Gardens or soemthing.  Don't use some lame half assed tourist trap that is only there to get STAR bonds so a developer can build suburban retail centers and star bond them too.

JoCo should be teaming up with other area counties to put Union Station to use.  That would be my first wish.  I dont want museums in the suburbs. I don't want culture in the suburbs.  I want to the real deal.  I want an urban core that is thriving with museums and culture. Can we do that first?

But they don't want to do that, and it's obvious they don't.  Then, pass a real tax and buld a real regional attraction.

This is nothing but a way to STAR bond a massive suburban devleopment.

That's all it is.

Grid you are transparent - if this was being built at crackerneck we would be hearing about what a great synergy it will make with Bass Pro. 

[GRID]

Grid you are transparent - if this was being built at crackerneck we would be hearing about what a great synergy it will make with Bass Pro.  

BS.

First off, the arena in Indy is not a supertiff.  It's not even a tif.  It's funded with a TD sales tax.  The arena is not some little tourist attraction used to land star bonds so Indy can build new un-needed retail.  It's there is help stabilize an existing retail area that will have much competition from BS and LS soon.  If Indy didn't find a way to keep people coming to the mall area, it would have been bad for Indy and really all of east jax.  The arena should go a long way to help keep the area from going downhill.  I think it was a good investment that will not compete with Sprint.  We did not build sprint for small concerts and graduations or suburban minor league hockey.

I have always stated that if a suburabn arena were to go in, it should go in an area that will help an area that will need the help.  Again, no state or city money went to the arena.  It's funded with a sales tax.

Now, I HAVE ABSOLUTELY BLASSTED the cities of Lee's Summit and Blue Springs over and over again for the tax breaks those cities gave out to Summit Woods and Adams Dairy Landing.  I have even been vocal about the Indy Bass Pro. I think the super tiff for that was a bit overdone.  But again, at least the money was used to remove rock and help stabilize a mature retail area in a area with challenging demographics.

I have also supported many projects on the Kansas side.  I was very much in favor of a Wizards soccer stadium in OP. (NOT OLATHE or DESOTO), but OP.  That was before Bannister Mall plans.

I support projects that make sense.  I don't give a shit about eastern jackson county in general.  But I don't see the need to let the I-70 corridor fall into blight.

So get over the "if it were in crackerneck" bullshit.

This project is total BS and anybody with a brain and an ounce of urban planning knowlege knows it.

[knucklehead]

A natural history museum is pretty far down on my wish list of cultural attractions.

KU already has one in Lawrence. Went once. Have no desire to go back. I found the stuffed animals that used to be at the KC museum to be creepy. Ditto the stuffed deer at Cabella's. I hear there is a good dinasour skeletion exhibit in Hays Kansas. That doesn't seem to have turned Hays into a tourist haven.  

I am not against natural history museums. I just question their ability to draw tourists from more than 30 miles away when they just have traveling exhibits. Why travel to KC to see a knock off in the middle of a suburb  when you could go to Chicago or New York and see the real deal.

[AJoD]

Build a fucking attraction with public money.  A REAL attraction.  A bottanical Gardens or soemthing.

Overland Park has a botanical garden and arbortetum.

We went a couple weeks ago for the first time and were pretty impressed.  While it's certainly not on the scale of some botanical gardens, it's a pretty cool space and takes advantage of the relatively far flung location.

Not sure how much it's funded by taxes vs. donation.

[Slappy the Wang]

A few years ago I may have applauded OP's efforts in landing this deal.  Perhaps the recent economy has jaded my judgement, but I can't imagine planning a vacation around the American Natural History Museum ANYWHERE IN THE MIDWEST.  For that matter, Disney Olathe wouldn't get me either.  This is a huge undertaking and the retail requirements to sustain the STAR bonds is amazing.  What's the schedule on this deal?  There's no way retailers who emerge from the current economy are going to be running toward new deals...instead, they'll be licking their wounds determining how to cautiously inflate prices back to pre-recession levels.  I just don't see it working...at least not in the near future.

SIDEBAR...the museum is one of those things that would have been cool at Union Station...does anyone remember Union Station?

[GRID]

They will get tenants.  But they will come from other areas of JoCo.  Forcing retail in suburban areas with STAR bonds? That is just urban planning suicide.  Ten years from now when OP has tons of vacant shopping centers and the centers they do have don't pay taxes, they won't have to think hard to figure out what happened.

I guess I should support projects like this since it will ultimately help destroy Johnson County as we know it an bring suburban blight to the area.  That's what lenexa thinks anyway.

[DaveKCMO]

And so much for Lenexa's attempts to build a new town center.

[KCPowercat]

Natural History Museums are great for busloads of school kids....about time KC got one but I'm not crying about it's location.

[aknowledgeableperson]

That is just urban planning suicide.  Ten years from now when OP has tons of vacant shopping centers and the centers they do have don't pay taxes, they won't have to think hard to figure out what happened.

Like Zona Rosa and Metro North????

[GRID]

Like Zona Rosa and Metro North????

zona rosa is not a super tiff.  metro north is just a horribly run mall.  Different situation.  More like giving out tifs to Summit Fair which could hurt the Indep Center area.

[Highlander]

Like Zona Rosa and Metro North????

While Zona Rosa is a huge improvement over Metro North, I question whether it needed a TIF at all to be built and survive.  It already had a huge advantage over MN by location alone, not to mention newness and the more attractive concept.  I agree with GRID, TIF's for suburban centers on the periphery of the metro is just an incredible waste of taxpayer money and the epitome of poor planning.  All they do is encourage yet another leap frog in the development scheme leaving abandoned malls in their wake, some of them publically subsidized.  TIF's in urban areas can act to reverse the madness a bit and I am all for that as long as we are not robbing the urban Peter to pay the urban Paul (e.g., robbing the Plaza for Downtown and vice versa). 

[shinatoo]

zona rosa is not a super tiff.  metro north is just a horribly run mall.  Different situation.  More like giving out tifs to Summit Fair which could hurt the Indep Center area.

Would you just quit. Summit Fair is 9 miles from Independence Center. 10 miles from Ward parkway and has all of Lees summit, Raymore and Grandview and Raytown to draw from. I will effect Independence center but not to any degree that you are imagining. I live in south Lee's Summit and it is a forty minute drive to Independence Center, so I never ever go. I'm glad I will have some higher end shopping close by.

[GRID]

Would you just quit. Summit Fair is 9 miles from Independence Center. 10 miles from Ward parkway and has all of Lees summit, Raymore and Grandview and Raytown to draw from. I will effect Independence center but not to any degree that you are imagining. I live in south Lee's Summit and it is a forty minute drive to Independence Center, so I never ever go. I'm glad I will have some higher end shopping close by.

40 minutes via what a skate board?  I can get from Blue Springs to Olathe is 40 minutes (or less).

Seriosly.  I'm sure LS can support Summit Fair. I just dont' like all the tiffs that went into it.  If you use massive subsidies to build in a suburban greenfield, then maybe the market is not quite ready for the retail yet.  Wait a few more years and build the development without the subsidies.

[NDTeve]

Would you just quit. Summit Fair is 9 miles from Independence Center. 10 miles from Ward parkway and has all of Lees summit, Raymore and Grandview and Raytown to draw from. I will effect Independence center but not to any degree that you are imagining. I live in south Lee's Summit and it is a forty minute drive to Independence Center, so I never ever go. I'm glad I will have some higher end shopping close by.

Bwaaaaaaaaaa 

[LenexatoKCMO]

Would you just quit. Summit Fair is 9 miles from Independence Center. 10 miles from Ward parkway and has all of Lees summit, Raymore and Grandview and Raytown to draw from. I will effect Independence center but not to any degree that you are imagining. I live in south Lee's Summit and it is a forty minute drive to Independence Center, so I never ever go. I'm glad I will have some higher end shopping close by.

Well cool, I guess we all just keep moving further out into far south/north/east/west Timbuktu and expect tax-supported retail development to save us from the drive. 

[knucklehead]

What is really astounding here is the size of the TIF - $100 million.

I don't mind that much if a suburban development gets some public assistance with the cost of installing public infrastructure, such as a new freeway interchange or four laning a public street.

But $100 million at 135th and nall is nuts. There won't be any new interchanges built there and what public infrastructure that is required will not cost anything close to $100 million.

[geeman68]

Would you just quit. Summit Fair is 9 miles from Independence Center. 10 miles from Ward parkway and has all of Lees summit, Raymore and Grandview and Raytown to draw from. I will effect Independence center but not to any degree that you are imagining. I live in south Lee's Summit and it is a forty minute drive to Independence Center, so I never ever go. I'm glad I will have some higher end shopping close by.

Good gracious!  40 minutes??!  It doesn't take me 40 minutes from 71Hwy and 140th, how far SOUTH do you live?  Why doesn't everyone try... moving inward?!  LOL.

[ComandanteCero]

On another note, I find this kind of comment grating coming from a reporting standpoint:

If the project is actually built, it stands to turn Overland Park?s 135th Street into a tourist haven. The project is planned just north of the Nicklaus Golf Club and a couple miles east of a new soccer complex that will open later this month.

This is the kind of statement I would expect as a quote from one of the developers or other interested parties, but not a supposedly objective observer reporting the news.  It departs from the facts to make a specious conjecture while transitioning to numbers being touted by the developers.  Shouldn't an editor pick that stuff up? 

[GRID]

On another note, I find this kind of comment grating coming from a reporting standpoint:



This is the kind of statement I would expect as a quote from one of the developers or other interested parties, but not a supposedly objective observer reporting the news.  It departs from the facts to make a specious conjecture while transitioning to numbers being touted by the developers.  Shouldn't an editor pick that stuff up?  

This is so common with the KC Star and their JoCo residing KU grad writers. That statement will piss a lot of people off, but it's true.  The Star in more ways than one acts like a small town paper with a bunch of interns running it.