OFFICIAL - East Village

Issues concerning Downtown as described by the Downtown Council. River to 31st Street, I-35 to Bruce R. Watkins.
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normalthings
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Re: OFFICIAL - East Village

Post by normalthings »

FangKC wrote: Mon Sep 06, 2021 11:58 pm Kiewit regional headquarters at Lenexa City Center
Freightquote headquarters, south Kansas City, MO
Dairy Farmers of America headquarters, Kansas City, KS
Burns & McDonnell headquarters expansion, KCMO
Brookside 51 apartments, KCMO
51 Main apartments, KCMO
AMC Theaters headquarters, Leawood, KS
Creative Planning headquarters, and two other office buildings, 110th St. Overland Park
Park Place development, mixed use., Leawood KS
Polsinelli headquarters, KCMO
various surburban apartment complexes around the Metro.

https://vantrustrealestate.com/list-properties/
One of those more recent office projects was pitched for new construction downtown but the business's employees were centered in the suburbs so they built there instead. Vantrust has their Crown Center office tower proposal from this year which is alive as far as anyone knows. Washington Square Park is alive too and slowly progress is made unwinding the many covenants and easements.
Last edited by normalthings on Tue Sep 07, 2021 12:20 am, edited 2 times in total.
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Re: OFFICIAL - East Village

Post by FangKC »

Creative Planning?
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Re: OFFICIAL - East Village

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Rapidly growing wealth management company, if you’re asking who they are.
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Re: OFFICIAL - East Village

Post by earthling »

VanTrust doesn't have a lot of experience with urban projects though. Hope they don't create isolated islands. 51/Main and Whole Foods apts are good tests but E Village needs better than typical lego block buildings.
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Re: OFFICIAL - East Village

Post by DaveKCMO »

Even if they were really good at it, giving an entire infill neighborhood over to a single master developer isn't the only way to succeed. Once the stadium location is settled, they should just write a quick zoning overlay (if needed) and auction off the properties to the highest bidder to develop individually.
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Re: OFFICIAL - East Village

Post by KCPowercat »

missingkc wrote: Sun Aug 22, 2021 7:38 pm Who are friendly forces? Friendly to whom? With respect to what?
Friendly selling land for a stadium
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Re: OFFICIAL - East Village

Post by dukuboy1 »

normalthings wrote: Tue Sep 07, 2021 12:02 am
FangKC wrote: Mon Sep 06, 2021 11:58 pm Kiewit regional headquarters at Lenexa City Center
Freightquote headquarters, south Kansas City, MO
Dairy Farmers of America headquarters, Kansas City, KS
Burns & McDonnell headquarters expansion, KCMO
Brookside 51 apartments, KCMO
51 Main apartments, KCMO
AMC Theaters headquarters, Leawood, KS
Creative Planning headquarters, and two other office buildings, 110th St. Overland Park
Park Place development, mixed use., Leawood KS
Polsinelli headquarters, KCMO
various surburban apartment complexes around the Metro.

https://vantrustrealestate.com/list-properties/
One of those more recent office projects was pitched for new construction downtown but the business's employees were centered in the suburbs so they built there instead. Vantrust has their Crown Center office tower proposal from this year which is alive as far as anyone knows. Washington Square Park is alive too and slowly progress is made unwinding the many covenants and easements.
Just curious if you know who/which company was involved with being pitched office downtown but opted for the suburbs? If I remember right AMC had a downtown office for a long time and when they jumped ship to KS with the incentives they left offices behind. I would not think Dairy Farmers or Freightquote would have been serious about downtown. Freightqoute HQ wanted to be as close to the intermodal places as possible I'm sure. Also the Dairy Farmers place was in the Northland by the airport and jumped ship to WYCO in Village West which I could see still making it easier for thier staff to get to new HQ for anyone who lived up North & the KS side suburbs.
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Re: OFFICIAL - East Village

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It could be Creative Planning. I always wondered for the last few years why they never built a tower downtown.

AMC probably could've done a tower too, but my guess is they wanted to do a campus-style place like some of the tech companies are doing- and to their credit they did find a great location intertwined to Leawood's Park Place & Town Center.

Idk if Creative Planning considers what they have a "campus" but it sure doesn't seem like one. It's right on a noisy highway and just looks like a giant blue box. That's why they seemed like so much logical fit for a tower downtown, because they didn't really do anything special with where they're at from what I can tell.
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Re: OFFICIAL - East Village

Post by flyingember »

AlkaliAxel wrote: Tue Sep 07, 2021 2:16 pm It could be Creative Planning. I always wondered for the last few years why they never built a tower downtown.

AMC probably could've done a tower too, but my guess is they wanted to do a campus-style place like some of the tech companies are doing- and to their credit they did find a great location intertwined to Leawood's Park Place & Town Center.

Idk if Creative Planning considers what they have a "campus" but it sure doesn't seem like one. It's right on a noisy highway and just looks like a giant blue box. That's why they seemed like so much logical fit for a tower downtown, because they didn't really do anything special with where they're at from what I can tell.
AMC is one that I would tell recruiters I would consider if they came back downtown. I always would get 3-4 emails and calls when they had an opening. I wasn't that interested in working there so it was a good one to use so they know where people want jobs at.
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Re: OFFICIAL - East Village

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earthling wrote: Tue Sep 07, 2021 8:04 am VanTrust doesn't have a lot of experience with urban projects though. Hope they don't create isolated islands. 51/Main and Whole Foods apts are good tests but E Village needs better than typical lego block buildings.
Being Master Developer doesn't automatically mean they will develop a specific parcel themselves. I agree with DaveKCMO that they should start putting out RFPs for specific parcels. Especially now that they control the Ozark Life Insurance parking lot.
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Re: OFFICIAL - East Village

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It never made sense to me that AMC went to Leawood. Especially with founder Stan Durwood interest in redeveloping the south loop before he died. It always made more sense for them to build offices next to MainStreet Theater and use it as their testing concepts theater. It always smelled to me more of then executives choosing a location near their houses for their own personal convenience while dipping into the incentive pool. Sadly, I don't even know if that management team is still working there.

Being in Leawood also caused them to lose a visible corporate presence on the skyline.
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Re: OFFICIAL - East Village

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FangKC wrote: Tue Sep 07, 2021 2:51 pm It always smelled to me more of then executives choosing a location near their houses for their own personal convenience while dipping into the incentive pool. Sadly, I don't even know if that management team is still working there.

Being in Leawood also caused them to lose a visible corporate presence on the skyline.
Executive and employee location drives all of our local corporate locations. Without good schools in the core and a small northland population, this means everything is shifted south.
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Re: OFFICIAL - East Village

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normalthings wrote: Tue Sep 07, 2021 3:36 pm
FangKC wrote: Tue Sep 07, 2021 2:51 pm It always smelled to me more of then executives choosing a location near their houses for their own personal convenience while dipping into the incentive pool. Sadly, I don't even know if that management team is still working there.

Being in Leawood also caused them to lose a visible corporate presence on the skyline.
Executive and employee location drives all of our local corporate locations. Without good schools in the core and a small northland population, this means everything is shifted south.
I’ll add that easy highway access from northland to Joco also hurts downtown.
Last edited by normalthings on Tue Sep 07, 2021 4:39 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: OFFICIAL - East Village

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normalthings wrote: Tue Sep 07, 2021 4:04 pm
normalthings wrote: Tue Sep 07, 2021 3:36 pm
FangKC wrote: Tue Sep 07, 2021 2:51 pm It always smelled to me more of then executives choosing a location near their houses for their own personal convenience while dipping into the incentive pool. Sadly, I don't even know if that management team is still working there.

Being in Leawood also caused them to lose a visible corporate presence on the skyline.
Executive and employee location drives all of our local corporate locations. Without good schools in the core and a small northland population, this means everything is shifted south.
I’ll add that east highway access from northland road Joco also hurts downtown.
I wonder how it makes hiring for young well educated candidates from out of state
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Re: OFFICIAL - East Village

Post by grovester »

normalthings wrote: Tue Sep 07, 2021 4:04 pm
normalthings wrote: Tue Sep 07, 2021 3:36 pm
FangKC wrote: Tue Sep 07, 2021 2:51 pm It always smelled to me more of then executives choosing a location near their houses for their own personal convenience while dipping into the incentive pool. Sadly, I don't even know if that management team is still working there.

Being in Leawood also caused them to lose a visible corporate presence on the skyline.
Executive and employee location drives all of our local corporate locations. Without good schools in the core and a small northland population, this means everything is shifted south.
I’ll add that east highway access from northland road Joco also hurts downtown.
I'm gonna need a translator for this one! It is mgsports adjacent.
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Re: OFFICIAL - East Village

Post by normalthings »

Anecdotally, I would say it hurts alot. Data shows we can attract top tier young talent. Issue I have seen is that they don't want to drive to Cerner in suburbia everyday and end up leaving. We could be attracting and retaining alot more if we had these businesses in downtown.

WFH = young people want to be in-person from what I have seen. I doubt WFH will do that much to boost downtown amongst the recent graduate age group. I have been hearing that established professionals in KC's top paying fields can now work from the NY or CA offices where before they had to be in KC. For those making bank, WFH will allow them to leave our metro or to never come here in the first place.
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Re: OFFICIAL - East Village

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normalthings wrote: Tue Sep 07, 2021 4:38 pm Anecdotally, I would say it hurts alot. Data shows we can attract top tier young talent. Issue I have seen is that they don't want to drive to Cerner in suburbia everyday and end up leaving. We could be attracting and retaining alot more if we had these businesses in downtown.

WFH = young people want to be in-person from what I have seen. I doubt WFH will do that much to boost downtown amongst the recent graduate age group. I have been hearing that established professionals in KC's top paying fields can now work from the NY or CA offices where before they had to be in KC. For those making bank, WFH will allow them to leave our metro.

I think our school district is really hampering some of the opportunities in regards to WFH.
Yeah from the people I know who went to top universities in the states I don’t know any that are willing to work in the suburbs especially in KC which is not especially naturally beautiful
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Re: OFFICIAL - East Village

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Wouldn't that mean we're in a quasi-death spiral for companies in KC then? For example, if companies have to go to suburbs because the workers live there, then that means new workers in KC all have to keep going to the suburbs too because that's where the companies are going. It all just keeps feeding and begetting itself for the suburbs.

I guess the question is, how do you stop that trend? Because you're right, no top talent young person is going to work in KC unless they're *atleast* going to be downtown. Nobody from Stanford or wherever is moving to Gardner, KS. Once again, all you'll get is Joe from Iowa State Univ who's 35 and has 2 kids. This trend needs to be changed.
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Re: OFFICIAL - East Village

Post by Riverite »

AlkaliAxel wrote: Tue Sep 07, 2021 5:36 pm Wouldn't that mean we're in a quasi-death spiral for companies in KC then? For example, if companies have to go to suburbs because the workers live there, then that means new workers in KC all have to keep going to the suburbs too because that's where the companies are going. It all just keeps feeding and begetting itself for the suburbs.

I guess the question is, how do you stop that trend? Because you're right, no top talent young person is going to work in KC unless they're *atleast* going to be downtown. Nobody from Stanford or wherever is moving to Gardner, KS. Once again, all you'll get is Joe from Iowa State Univ who's 35 and has 2 kids. This trend needs to be changed.
Startups can change things, invest in innovation districts and bring in KU or UMKC as a partner so you can drive new innovation, market it differently to the suburbs
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Re: OFFICIAL - East Village

Post by FangKC »

I still think it's executives and company heads driving location selection. I have never once in my life been asked where I wanted my job to be located. I've worked in public relations/public affairs for large organizations and never once did any of my employers poll employees where they wanted to work.
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