OFFICIAL - East Village

[FangKC]

Some curious ground work / drilling going on in one of the surface lots. Stadium related?

Which parking lot?

All I saw was a mini excavator, piles of gravel and concrete debris, and some construction stuff

There are probably filling out that whole block with drive-in window fast food restaurants, that will only be there for like five years before they are demolished for a baseball stadium.

[smh]

ULI Hines competition winner announced. Fusion was really a great submission and mercifully stadium free. I think the Canadians are ahead of us on producing good urbanism!

Kevin's write-up:

https://cityscenekc.com/canadian-teams- ... i-contest/

Final submission materials:

https://uli.secure-platform.com/a/galle ... tails/4028

[GRID]

ULI Hines competition winner announced. Fusion was really a great submission and mercifully stadium free. I think the Canadians are ahead of us on producing good urbanism!

Kevin's write-up:

https://cityscenekc.com/canadian-teams- ... i-contest/

Final submission materials:

https://uli.secure-platform.com/a/galle ... tails/4028

I like it. They put some thought and effort into it. I still don't think the stadium there is a good idea. Stadium should go in east crossroads or vine district.

[KCPowercat]

The one benefit of here is the parking infrastructure is in place. It would have to be reproduced in the east crossroads.

[taxi]

People on this forum often quibble about E. Xroads vs E. Village for the stadium. It's practically the same thing, about a half mile apart. If it goes in one location, people will be parking and walking from the other. It's a 10-15 minute walk.

[KCPowercat]

People on this forum often quibble about E. Xroads vs E. Village for the stadium. It's practically the same thing, about a half mile apart. If it goes in one location, people will be parking and walking from the other. It's a 10-15 minute walk.

Maybe I'm underestimating KC residents but I don't see many parking at the 11th and Oak garage for a stadium at 18th & Troost. Hell most don't like parking at that garage for Sprint Center!

[dukuboy1]

cool concept winner, and unique ideas. However I fear that the East Village will continue to just sit there with no real plan, and most importantly no real money people wanting to invest in that area. Maybe there will be a developer that adds something but I think the development in going to have to encircle it, like it has, and then slowly creep toward it for anything to happen. Downtown ballpark is the one spark that could light the area, but it may not ne the best, as some have lamented. But not being the best may not matter, especially if want something there besides fields of open parking lots. Sad to se that East end just so barren

[GRID]

The one benefit of here is the parking infrastructure is in place. It would have to be reproduced in the east crossroads.

Parking is there, but no other infrastructure to handle stadium traffic. Downtown streets and highways are just not set up for it and the way it looks, modot isn't going to fix that problem. Look at the road infrastructure around stadiums in Denver, Minneapolis, San Diego, Baltimore etc and those are cities that have way more transit options to the games than a streetcar five blocks away.

And no matter how many renderings you come up with and how many garages you show people, a stadium will create a ton of new parking demand and there will be parking lots all over the east side of downtown and probably east of the loop if a stadium goes up there.

I would just rather see it built out as an urban place.

A stadium more southeast of downtown will have more traffic distribution with bigger streets and the ability to put parking away from the city in an area like what they do in Denver where parking is strung in lots far to the northeast of the lodo area.

I'm telling you. You don't want the stadium too close to areas of the city that you want to be vibrant all the time. You want it off to the side somewhere. Even in Denver, Balt, DC, SD, Seattle, Clev, PItts, the stadium areas are massive dead zones most of the time and during games they are traffic messes. An urban stadium would be great, but it needs to not be in the loop.

[KCPowercat]

Wait, you told us that we should move traffic onto Broadway because we have SO much capacity that's not used downtown?

I don't have a problem with east crossroads as a site.

[GRID]

Wait, you told us that we should move traffic onto Broadway because we have SO much capacity that's not used downtown?

I don't have a problem with east crossroads as a site.

So you are going to compare trying to get 10,000 vehicles into the east loop within an hour time period (or exiting all at once), to probably a few thousand over 24 hours that might stay on Broadway rather than take the interstate around downtown? Come on.

You live there. Please enlighten me on how those streets in the east loop with their access to the loop highway system will handle game traffic? It won't be able to without major improvements. Even in cities with robust transit systems, urban stadiums have better peak type traffic capability than Downtown KC does. Downtown KC has TONS of highways, but very few high capacity ways to get to them from the east loop and people will be trapped inside garages for way too long.

You will paralyze downtown KC during games, not make it a destination and people won't want to go to games. You can't ignore the traffic flow issues. The streetcar might take some pressure off, but not much.

[kboish]

I think First Fridays attracted 10,000 or more people in the past during a pretty narrow timeframe. That area of the crossroads was busy, not "paralyzed". Areas outside that zone were not similarly busy unless they had their own events at that time. I think a downtown ballpark would operate similarly.

[GRID]

I think First Fridays attracted 10,000 or more people in the past during a pretty narrow timeframe. That area of the crossroads was busy, not "paralyzed". Areas outside that zone were not similarly busy unless they had their own events at that time. I think a downtown ballpark would operate similarly.

But that's why it should go to the crossroads east area. You have a vast area of gridded streets without highway ramps. In the downtown area, the freeways actually get in the way of having that traffic flow. The only way it might work is if cops shut down all the access points to the freeways and push all the traffic out of the loop area into the street grid and let them find their way back to a highway somewhere else.

Otherwise you are going to have to build some big multilane flyover ramps and wide streets to get a large volume of the traffic onto some part of the loop in a higher volume capacity.

They have an event at bartle hall or pac and the broadway exit is a mess. I honestly don't think you guys understand the impact of 20-35k trying to get into or out of the east loop at the same time. Nothing that demanding exists in the downtown area. It can be done, but it would require a total rebuild of the east loop. And it would turn the east side of downtown into highway flyovers and parking structures. Just look at Minneapolis or Baltimore. That is what you would need to do.

You can't just toss a ballpark in east village. The infrastructure of the entire east side of downtown and beyond would have to be heavily modified.

I'm just being honest from a traffic perspective.

[KCPowercat]

Grid, your comments about downtown capacity were not just about Broadway

That's all downtown is is highways. All the surface streets downtown are deserted most of the time. Even Grand is empty most of the time. There is so much capacity downtown, it's just not being used.

I believe you when you say improvements would need to be made. That would need to happen at either location.

[KCKev]

Sound to me like just the excuse to build out the streetcar. How about car pooling. Adding to freeway isn't the only option!

Party Train. Next stop dispensary.

[GRID]

Grid, your comments about downtown capacity were not just about Broadway

That's all downtown is is highways. All the surface streets downtown are deserted most of the time. Even Grand is empty most of the time. There is so much capacity downtown, it's just not being used.

I believe you when you say improvements would need to be made. That would need to happen at either location.

But you are talking about two very different traffic flow issues. Yeah, the streets downtown are empty, especially in east loop. But pushing some extra traffic down a couple of north south corridors through the day is different than stadium traffic.

I just want a downtown ballpark to be successful that's all and I think you are going to have a traffic nightmare on your hands which will justify the nonsense that suburbanites spew about downtown traffic and parking.

You travel. You know that KC's surface streets are different than Denver or MSP or Baltimore or Cleveland etc etc. Downtown KC has no higher volume corridors. All the traffic is on the highways which has created much of the problem with KC not having streets like that along with the topography to some degree.

Even St Louis has Market Street or Broadway which carry way more peak traffic than anything in downtown KC and they have some good hiway access since the highways are far enough way to accommodate some decent on ramps. KC has neither. Downtown KC has small streets that are on top of the highway system which doesn't allow for good access to them.

You could do something that would function better further from center of downtown. Taking advantage of existing high volume Truman, Paseo, 71 and have places to tuck away some additional parking like under the highways etc without wrecking the urban fabric of downtown. I'm telling you, a downtown stadium will just generate a shit ton of parking lots just east of the loop dividing downtown from the east side even further.

[KCPowercat]

How is the east crossroads going to take advantage of 71? Down to 22nd? Would east village be able to take advantage of 71 easier and Truman just as easy? Paseo too?

I definitely defer to you on traffic/infrastructure type things, my only point was better established parking lots closer to the east village location but yeah you are probably right it would still spur some new garages east if that wasn't thought about / addressed as part of the plan.

[GRID]

How is the east crossroads going to take advantage of 71? Down to 22nd? Would east village be able to take advantage of 71 easier and Truman just as easy? Paseo too?

I definitely defer to you on traffic/infrastructure type things, my only point was better established parking lots closer to the east village location but yeah you are probably right it would still spur some new garages east if that wasn't thought about / addressed as part of the plan.

Imagine all the traffic that dumps onto 70 from Blue Ridge or onto 435 from Raytown Rd after games. How would you approach even 10% of that type of moving traffic onto the loop in such a short amount of time? The access points to the loop now are short, single lane etc. You would not even have places to que on the streets. And even if it were possible to dump some traffic onto the loop, it would bog the entire thing down since it can't handle it. I'm primarily talking about the east side of the loop.

Being down near 71 creates traffic options to build or improve on things by dumping traffic onto 71. Southbound would flow freely and people could go all the way around to KS if they want or get off and take another route. To the north, they would disperse at the southwest corner of the loop and go different directions. You would have to use those access points anyway because like I said, you would have to close a lot of the access to the loop for game traffic to prevent gridlock.

[beautyfromashes]

This area needs a whole rebranding, something that will reinvigorate some action. Change it to the Monarchs Place or Monarch District and change Holmes or Charlotte to Satchel Paige Way. “East Village” probably needs to die.

[FangKC]

That area used to be called Happy Hollow.

https://kchistory.org/islandora/object/ ... ffset%5D=0

When KMBC Radio was in the Pickwick Hotel, there had a radio show called Happy Hollow--pulled from the neighborhood the hotel was in.

https://library.umkc.edu/Manuscripts/C ... -happy.pdf

https://pendergastkc.org/collection/970 ... humdingers

I'm much more inclined to favor the original names of local neighborhoods than inventions such as East Village. People may thing Happy Hollow is hokey, but San Francisco has Cow Hollow.

https://www.google.com/maps/place/San+F ... 4155?hl=en

[taxi]

Wasn't there a Happy Hollow Liquors?