KCPowercat wrote:
I don't think I have seen a cleaner downtown....or safer.
downtown KC is actually in quite decent shape for visitors now. there's a general lack of pedestrian activity overall, but the hotel & increased conventions could help turn that around and make downtown a little more like the plaza in terms of overall energy.
more of the same governing by sound byte by flunkhouser. what a boob and total embarrassment to such a fine city. you people really set KC back about 10 years putting him anywhere near the 29th floor. even people from the suburbs aren't complaining about downtown being dirty or dangerous anymore-- just the mayor.
Downtowner wrote:
And to top it all off, it sounds like we have a Mayor that is still against the hotel idea. On 980 tonight our boorish Mayor, Mr Progress himself, said the following:"Rather than do more hotels downtown, we need to make sure it's clean and safe". You can't have a new hotel and be clean at the same time? So much for multi-tasking. Had he been mayor instead of Kay Barnes at the time, we'd still have the desolation and haunted houses on the south end of downtown. Likely no H & R block HQ. He's a complete oaf.
As for the site, the hereford seems disconnected. We've had a long history of putting everything in the wrong place ---kemper in the west bottoms, casinos nowhere near downtown (riverside!), stadiums way out, etc---I'm not sure a large convention hotel on the other side of the interstate canyon makes sense.
So can this happen without funk's support or is this all a waste of time?
Downtowner wrote:
---I'm not sure a large convention hotel on the other side of the interstate canyon makes sense.
That sounds like the arguments made when there was the discussion of taking Bartle's expansion over the highway or make an 'L' and take it along 14th St. If you want to bridge the highway and tie in Crossroads and central downtown the best thing to do would be to put this hotel south of the highway.
I may be right. I may be wrong. But there is a lot of gray area in-between.
I would agree if the loop was fully developed and there were no sites in the loop available. The P&L block has been underutilized for at lest 40 years. The hotel there would finally add the density the loop needs. The enitre P&L district has shifted the center of activity DT south, a movement that has been occuring ever since pioneers drug themselves up the riverbank.
I agree that the P&L building/immediate adjacent property needs to be filled before "bridging the gap". This would create a developed corridor between the CC and the P&L district/Sprint Center. Density creates a far more comfortable "walkability" visual for pedestrians, much like NY and Chicago (or our own Plaza), where one starts walking and soon discovers that you have gone much further than you think.
That said, the bridging of the freeway gap is important and the hotel plan well thought out. One concern would be that the hotel might seem an island unto itself without significant surrounding development to tie it into the Crossroads. The mention of saving and incorporating the historical buildings east of the hotel site into a supporting development would help to solve that dilemma. The issue of what and how to pay for that surrounding development could be a major hindrance to a successful plan. That issue would not be present for the most part with the P&L Building hotel site on 14th Street.
It is interesting that anyone is supporting a convention hotel outside the downtown loop. Especially when there are numerous threads with people bemoaning all the vacant lots still left there, and how embarrassing it is to have visitors see them. What a bad image it is for the City.
Let's just take a brief assessment. The vacant lots at the NE corner of 14th and Wyandotte, and the SW corner of 13th and Baltimore. The empty buildings south of 14th Street between Baltimore and Wyandotte. The lot on the SE corner of 14th and Baltimore. The two lots along Truman Road between Grand and Main. The block on Grand between 12th and 13th streets. The lot on Broadway between 12th and 13th. The lot next to the Lyric Theater on 11th and Wyandotte. The vacant lot on the NE corner of 13th and Wyandotte west of the Clubhouse Lofts. The lot next to the grocery store at 13th and Walnut.
In some instances, buildings have already been demolished to clear the parcels for development.
Yet, people are proposing another site south of the Loop that might require demolishing more buildings on Site 5 (Hanna Rubber, Lane Blueprint and two other buildings); as well as the Hereford Association. Now we are for demolishing more buildings when we have sites already cleared for the hotel.
The City has already established a goal of creating a convention corridor along 14th Street. The Jury hotel plans helps do this. Funneling conventioneers down 14th Street makes a lot more sense than having them across the freeway.
We want to try and preserve and reuse as many historic buildings as possible for obvious reasons. The Hanna Rubber Co. building is well-maintained and has an attractive facade. It should be preserved, and not demolished for a convention hotel when other sites are already cleared. Reusing the Power and Light tower also accomplishes this goal.
We need to fill in the Loop as a priority before starting to worry about connecting to the Crossroads.
The deck parks over I-670, that are part of this proposed Kerr plan, are not funded, and may never happen.
FangKC wrote:
We need to fill in the Loop as a priority before starting to worry about connecting to the Crossroads.
That kind of talk takes me back 20plus years when the city was discussing Bartle's expansion. Points made on both sides were valid but the overriding factor for going over the highway was that there would be a continuous, straight line for the exhibition space which made the expansion more saleable to booking the space. At the same time many felt that downtown was constrained by the freeways around it and this was a way to bridge them and expand what downtown was (many at the time, when you said "downtown" you were talking just about the area INSIDE the loop, outside the loop was something else besides downtown). Even now, although the Crossroads is described as part of downtown it really is not connected. The PAC may help but face it the PAC is on the edge and because of Bartle will not really connect the two areas.
Building the hotel, if it is built, south of the highway will continue the effort to bringing the two areas together. It will do more for the greater downtown area than building it next to the P&L or anyplace else dt. It will help support the ballroom and truly make it the front door of the CC Complex.
I may be right. I may be wrong. But there is a lot of gray area in-between.
FangKC wrote:
It is interesting that anyone is supporting a convention hotel outside the downtown loop. Especially when there are numerous threads with people bemoaning all the vacant lots still left there, and how embarrassing it is to have visitors see them. What a bad image it is for the City.
Let's just take a brief assessment. The vacant lots at the NE corner of 14th and Wyandotte, and the SW corner of 13th and Baltimore. The empty buildings south of 14th Street between Baltimore and Wyandotte. The lot on the SE corner of 14th and Baltimore. The two lots along Truman Road between Grand and Main. The block on Grand between 12th and 13th streets. The lot on Broadway between 12th and 13th. The lot next to the Lyric Theater on 11th and Wyandotte. The vacant lot on the NE corner of 13th and Wyandotte west of the Clubhouse Lofts. The lot next to the grocery store at 13th and Walnut.
In some instances, buildings have already been demolished to clear the parcels for development.
Yet, people are proposing another site south of the Loop that might require demolishing more buildings on Site 5 (Hanna Rubber, Lane Blueprint and two other buildings); as well as the Hereford Association. Now we are for demolishing more buildings when we have sites already cleared for the hotel.
The City has already established a goal of creating a convention corridor along 14th Street. The Jury hotel plans helps do this. Funneling conventioneers down 14th Street makes a lot more sense than having them across the freeway.
We want to try and preserve and reuse as many historic buildings as possible for obvious reasons. The Hanna Rubber Co. building is well-maintained and has an attractive facade. It should be preserved, and not demolished for a convention hotel when other sites are already cleared. Reusing the Power and Light tower also accomplishes this goal.
We need to fill in the Loop as a priority before starting to worry about connecting to the Crossroads.
The deck parks over I-670, that are part of this proposed Kerr plan, are not funded, and may never happen.
Although I would support any plan at this point, putting the hotel next to the ballroom & PAC feels like something a city would do in the 1960s & 1970s. Just another mega-project concerned with being some freeway icon and convention campus than a living, working space for people. As a conventioneer would you rather walk out of your hotel at 16th/Wyandotte or 13th/Baltimore? Which locale would give you a more favorable take on your host city?
trailerkid wrote:
Although I would support any plan at this point
I was there in 2002. No, actually, I was there in 1992 when the Perot Plan was proposed. I can not freaking believe it's been that long. Anyway...
trailerkid wrote:
As a conventioneer would you rather walk out of your hotel at 16th/Wyandotte or 13th/Baltimore? Which locale would give you a more favorable take on your host city?
That's like 4 blocks. 13th and Balt is not exactly a happening area, it's across from the Ballroom, near the Muni etc. Not sure what the big difference is. It's not like 16th and Wyandotte is on the riverfront or even in some other part of the loop (like east or north loop). it's 4 blocks away and "maybe" another block from the activity of the P&L District.
