Westport

Discuss items in the urban core outside of Downtown as described above. Everything in the core including the east side (18th & Vine area), Northeast, Plaza, Westport, Brookside, Valentine, Waldo, 39th street, & the entire midtown area.
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chaglang
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Re: Westport

Post by chaglang »

You might also have a different level of risk tolerance. You can hear gunshots in Midtown most weekend nights. It doesn't seem to stop people from moving there.

To Highlander's post above, I do think the addition of residents will help some. But the city essentially giving the district to the bar owners and asking no change of behavior from them (operating hours, etc) in return will always be a problem. The bar owners like to argue that they make X amount of money for the city and should be left alone... so we are basically accepting those tax dollars to perpetuate a volatile situation.
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Re: Westport

Post by dukuboy1 »

That seems very knee jerk reaction. It would be like saying you shouldn’t live in Crossroads after this summers shooting. Random violence is just that, random. I think business owners in Westport may rethink their venue offerings & get away from dance clubs & or the “club” vibe. It always seems to bring in an element not looking to have fun. People more concerned with showing off than unwinding.
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Re: Westport

Post by brewcrew1000 »

I would be pretty surprised if people who live in apartments in midtown even really know about all the "crime" that happens unless it affects them personally or to a friend (Broken car window) because young people do not watch the local news, read the local paper or get on local sites like next door or ring neighbors. If some kind of crime does happen or they see/hear a shooting they do have the option to just move to a safer area, if they owned in the area they would most likely be more aware.
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Re: Westport

Post by dukuboy1 »

chaglang wrote: Sun Mar 01, 2020 4:12 pm You might also have a different level of risk tolerance. You can hear gunshots in Midtown most weekend nights. It doesn't seem to stop people from moving there.

To Highlander's post above, I do think the addition of residents will help some. But the city essentially giving the district to the bar owners and asking no change of behavior from them (operating hours, etc) in return will always be a problem. The bar owners like to argue that they make X amount of money for the city and should be left alone... so we are basically accepting those tax dollars to perpetuate a volatile situation.
I'm fairly certain the bar owners pay for all the security down there, or at least the majority of it. There may be some on duty officers around but the others are uniformed off duty which is paid for, along with the private security. Westport business owners are a tight knit group that want to eliminate the random violence for sure. Bars that stay open until 3am are not the issue. Sometimes it's a specific venue and sometimes it's just random. I think more residents of the area and a little gentrification of the surrounding area could do well for Westport to really make it a neighborhood with entertainment and retail instead of a an entertainment district with little residents.
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Re: Westport

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brewcrew1000 wrote: Mon Mar 02, 2020 9:53 am I would be pretty surprised if people who live in apartments in midtown even really know about all the "crime" that happens unless it affects them personally or to a friend (Broken car window) because young people do not watch the local news, read the local paper or get on local sites like next door or ring neighbors. If some kind of crime does happen or they see/hear a shooting they do have the option to just move to a safer area, if they owned in the area they would most likely be more aware.
This is true for my neighborhood (which doesn't have shootings or many violent crimes, but does have property crimes). I am on none of those websites and barely ever watch the local news, I feel super safe and know how to keep my property safe. Occasionally when I talk to some of the older crowd/facebook type in the neighborhood they give me the sense that I am living in a war zone and everything has gone to shit. There is constant drama of some kind for them. It just doesn't mesh with my daily reality.
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Re: Westport

Post by brewcrew1000 »

kboish wrote: Mon Mar 02, 2020 10:41 am
brewcrew1000 wrote: Mon Mar 02, 2020 9:53 am I would be pretty surprised if people who live in apartments in midtown even really know about all the "crime" that happens unless it affects them personally or to a friend (Broken car window) because young people do not watch the local news, read the local paper or get on local sites like next door or ring neighbors. If some kind of crime does happen or they see/hear a shooting they do have the option to just move to a safer area, if they owned in the area they would most likely be more aware.
This is true for my neighborhood (which doesn't have shootings or many violent crimes, but does have property crimes). I am on none of those websites and barely ever watch the local news, I feel super safe and know how to keep my property safe. Occasionally when I talk to some of the older crowd/facebook type in the neighborhood they give me the sense that I am living in a war zone and everything has gone to shit. There is constant drama of some kind for them. It just doesn't mesh with my daily reality.
I'm the same way, The Neighbor Ring app is kind of entertaining, people posting videos of packages getting stolen right off their porch, a video yesterday of a guy throwing a brick threw someones car window. Constant posts about hearing gun shots, i really think a lot of what these people are hearing are not gunshots but industrial type noises that sound like gun shots coming from railyards, industrial/construction sites,etc (rivets sound like a gun for example).
Older people have kind of ruined social media/facebook and possibly the internet because of their mass paranoia, political posts, fake news re-posts and everything else
mean
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Re: Westport

Post by mean »

To be completely fair, it's not older people that came online and saw the edgelord ways of 4chan and thought "oh shit, these are actual nazis and now it's OK to be a nazi!" and started going to rallies with tiki torches and stuff.
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grovester
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Re: Westport

Post by grovester »

Stupid Older people have kind of ruined social media/facebook and possibly the internet because of their mass paranoia, political posts, fake news re-posts and everything else

Fixed that for you.
mean
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Re: Westport

Post by mean »

It's probably a little unfair to blame only stupid people. There is also a large number of very good and very smart trolls deliberately sowing chaos, some pursuant to a political agenda or ideology but many just because they think it's funny when the media freaks out about whether the OK hand gesture is a nazi dog whistle.
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DColeKC
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Re: Westport

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Throwback started off as a 90's bar, didn't get very busy and became a hip-hop club. The owner of Yard Bar was accused of being a racist because he had a "do not play list" that DJ's had to follow. It basically said no hip-hop. So he goes out and rebrands Kaws into Bridgers, an all hip-hop bar. It is hard to explain the disappointment that one certain genre of music in nightclubs seems to attract all the violence. That genre is also beloved by all races for the most part. Well, maybe not today's version of hip-hop.

Westport just can't win. They put up metal detectors and they're racist because they're targeting a certain group of people. It's a never ending cycle.
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Re: Westport

Post by smh »

DColeKC wrote: Mon Mar 02, 2020 1:55 pm Throwback started off as a 90's bar, didn't get very busy and became a hip-hop club. The owner of Yard Bar was accused of being a racist because he had a "do not play list" that DJ's had to follow. It basically said no hip-hop. So he goes out and rebrands Kaws into Bridgers, an all hip-hop bar. It is hard to explain the disappointment that one certain genre of music in nightclubs seems to attract all the violence. That genre is also beloved by all races for the most part. Well, maybe not today's version of hip-hop.

Westport just can't win. They put up metal detectors and they're racist because they're targeting a certain group of people. It's a never ending cycle.
Diversify the uses. The concentration of 3am bars doesn't help the situation.
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TheLastGentleman
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Re: Westport

Post by TheLastGentleman »

smh wrote: Mon Mar 02, 2020 1:59 pmDiversify the uses. The concentration of 3am bars doesn't help the situation.
That's really the issue. Even Mass St. in Lawrence has a more diverse range of businesses, and that's a college town famous for partying. No reason why part of Kansas City's urban core has to be defined solely by one use like Westport is.
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chaglang
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Re: Westport

Post by chaglang »

dukuboy1 wrote: Mon Mar 02, 2020 10:13 am Bars that stay open until 3am are not the issue. Sometimes it's a specific venue and sometimes it's just random.
The citywide concentration of 3am bars in Westport, within the context of a bunch of 1am bars, is absolutely a problem. If you accept that the lack of business type diversity is an issue, then it's hard to say that the bar owners truly want to eliminate violence. They want to keep doing whatever they're doing and hope that people magically stop shooting each other outside.
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Re: Westport

Post by earthling »

Westport often oscillates from being metro party bar district to periods of focusing on neighborhoody restaurants targeting 30+. As more residential units go in, Westport Association needs to target back to the latter and *permanently* become less dependent on metro while still inviting to metro. Push to dump most of the party bars.
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Re: Westport

Post by dukuboy1 »

chaglang wrote: Tue Mar 03, 2020 9:59 am
dukuboy1 wrote: Mon Mar 02, 2020 10:13 am Bars that stay open until 3am are not the issue. Sometimes it's a specific venue and sometimes it's just random.
The citywide concentration of 3am bars in Westport, within the context of a bunch of 1am bars, is absolutely a problem. If you accept that the lack of business type diversity is an issue, then it's hard to say that the bar owners truly want to eliminate violence. They want to keep doing whatever they're doing and hope that people magically stop shooting each other outside.
Agreed they need to diversify the bar offerings in terms of 3am venues. There are spots downtown, river market open until 3am, but Westport has the concentration. Maybe look to change up a few bars to close earlier. But this latest shooting happened at 1:30am so who knows. The victim was 17, which raises a question of how/why they were there. There is no easy answer as others have stated because of optics of what Westport has done or bar owners have done to try to help create an environment that caters to those wanting to have fun & less to those looking for trouble. It's not an easy issue. But the more Westport can do to cater maybe less to a pure party crowd the better off they may be
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Re: Westport

Post by DColeKC »

earthling wrote: Tue Mar 03, 2020 10:11 am Westport often oscillates from being metro party bar district to periods of focusing on neighborhoody restaurants targeting 30+. As more residential units go in, Westport Association needs to target back to the latter and *permanently* become less dependent on metro while still inviting to metro. Push to dump most of the party bars.
The bars stay alive during the week by basically catering to the college crowd. PNL has never been able to attract the college crowd, even with heavily discounted pricing. Of course, PNL is never going to offer 1 dollar tall boys. By going after that crowd, it seems to keep the weekend crowds younger too. We all know younger crowds mixed with alcohol tend to cause issues. With the Alred guy buying up every bar and putting up corny, poorly done party bars, I don't see that aspect going away anytime soon.
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Re: Westport

Post by KCPowercat »

We have a college crowd?
mean
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Re: Westport

Post by mean »

I figured they all hung out at whatever Mike's Tavern is called now.
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Re: Westport

Post by WSPanic »

Brady's Public House, FWIW
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Re: Westport

Post by DColeKC »

KCPowercat wrote: Tue Mar 03, 2020 2:46 pm We have a college crowd?
Not sure they're actually in college, but they're college age to be certain. Yard Bar on Wednesday nights feels like a high school basement party. Take a look at Yard Bar's Facebook page.
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