urbanSTL

Plaza Holiday Inn will start coming down the week of Christmas. This is where Americo plans a 30 floor tower among other things.

Real estate market was starting to heat up ahead of this announcement.

TRACK TO THE FUTURE

Tom Gerend and others expect lightning to strike again for development along the streetcar extension. Millions in investment already have poured in.
https://www.bizjournals.com/kansascity/ ... nvest.html

    Projects, properties to ponder

    Exact Partners’ interest in the Main Street corridor extends beyond its two new apartment projects — it has three more projects in the works. The largest is a $75 million multiphase effort at the northwest corner of 37th and Main streets, where the developer has done separate test fits for a concert venue with a Class A restaurant and a food hall beneath a hotel in the former Kansas City National Guard Armory.

    Exact Partners completed $2.58 million in multiparcel transactions for much of that corner between November 2018 and May 2019. It plans to close on two more properties near planned streetcar stops — at 3215 and 3901 Main St. — before Christmas.

    Property records and interviews reveal activity all along the streetcar extension route, including:

    • Entities affiliated with New York-based developer Alchemy Ventures gobbled up at least seven properties within blocks of the streetcar extension, to the tune of $7.2 million, between March 2018 and April 2020.

    • Main & Main LLC, which shares a Kansas City address with Americo Life parent Financial Holding Corp., paid $6.6 million in July for the shuttered Country Club Plaza Holiday Inn. The seller, an affiliate of Chicago-based Janko Group, previously considered razing or renovating the 241-room hotel.

    • GLI Hospitality picked up the Best Western Plus Seville Plaza Hotel at 4309 Main St. for $8.5 million in August 2018, and G1 Real Estate in May 2020 snagged the Seville Plaza apartments at 4545 Main St. for $2.35 million.

    • In September 2019, Overland Park-based Price Brothers acquired eight parcels comprising much of the northeast corner of 31st and Main, including a Lutfi’s Fried Fish restaurant.

    • An affiliate of Antheus Capital, the New Jersey-based parent company of Mac Properties, on Nov. 4 nabbed approximately 1.6 acres along Main Street between Armour Boulevard and 36th Street. The parcels include Pancho’s Mexican Food and surface parking.

    • Clemons Real Estate and FTW Investments have leased space in the former Hostess Brands LLC building at 3 E. Armour Blvd., with an option to buy in the next year.

    • A buyer is circling the historic Katz Drug Store building at 3948 Main St., according to multiple real estate sources.

    • Hallmark Cards Inc. owns vacant tracts on two sides of Grand Boulevard’s intersection with 27th Street, totaling about 6.8 acres near the streetcar extension’s first planned stop. Property brochures tout the sites’ potential for high-rise office or multifamily developments.

    • Andrew Brain and Platform Ventures LLC are advancing a $45 million proposal to build 133 apartments in the vacant Westport High School building at 315 E. 39th St., plus a 20,000-square-foot office building, adjacent to the Plexpod Westport Commons coworking space.

Seems Midtown development will explode now that the streetcar expansion to UMKC is 100% financed and a go.  Many projects already announced specifically noting the streetcar as reason.  Single family homes through Midtown will also probably attract rehab house flippers, so not just developers.  Is an advantage of having a shorter rail line as it creates a hyper focus of TOD and extended development/rehab along a denser contiguous stretch rather than creating commuter sprawl along say a 60 mile line with stations spread further apart..  KC's streetcar functions more like a sidewalk accessible horizontal elevator to different districts rather than typical commuter use.  Being free to ride as well as not having to deal with a fare system or stations a bonus too.

And shorter rail lines will help densify contiguous TOD and related development from block to block, where longer commuter rail lines out of gate would only make commuter sprawl worse.

True dat.  But anyway, MIdtown boom is coming thanks to streetcar.  Already starting.

I'm jelly.

KCATA and KC Streetcar are discussing a Phase 3 rail expansion.

North Kansas City City Council has had meetings with streetcar staff to discuss first steps in getting a line built to their downtown. Local support for rail there is extremely high.

One of KCATA’s VPs suggested a line from NKC to downtown KC, over to the West bottoms and into KCK could be next. (Red Line is the route he said. Would extend farther north than what was drawn here)



All sources are saying a large framework will begin to move forward next week. Exciting updates coming soon.

NKC to KCK via 12th downtown is probably easier to fund than other Phase 3 potential lines as it appears to have largest tax base along that stretch, assuming TDD tax also used to fund.  I wonder if NKC would attempt to use casino income as well as they have for other infrastructure projects. 

3 Light:

Interior Renderings. Ground Breaking Ceremony in March

I was wondering if it would ever make it across the river. Huge news for downtown KCK, hopefully this kicks off some dense development along the Minnesota Ave corridor.

This is awesome news for the West Bottoms too. The buildings are dense, beautiful, and close to the activity of downtown but completely cut off by the bluff. Things have been slowly picking up in the past five years but with some infrastructure improvements and a streetcar connection the bottoms will turn this into the next hot spot.

5th & Main (Southern Corners):

Another exciting project is in the works in the River Market. EPC Real Estate plans a massive project that will (literally) span 2 massive surface lots at at 5th & Main. This project is across 5th street from the 90'  Flaherty Collins proposal shared here last month.

Developer: EPC Real Estate
Architect: NSPJ

189 units. 372 parking spaces. 10,000 sqft retail. 

Notable features: Project bridges over main street.

Ground Floor



Amenity Level



Elevations

According to NormalThings on the KCRag, an expansion is in the works for the Uptown Lofts (which is under construction right now). Location is Valentine Road and Broadway Boulevard. 

normalthings wrote: ↑

Dec 15, 2020

Uptown Lofts Annex in the works. 84 additional units. This replaces the Moxy Hotel in the parking lot.

ldai_phs wrote: ↑

Dec 14, 2020

5th & Main (Southern Corners):

Another exciting project is in the works in the River Market. EPC Real Estate plans a massive project that will (literally) span 2 massive surface lots at at 5th & Main. This project is across 5th street from the 90'  Flaherty Collins proposal shared here last month.

Developer: EPC Real Estate
Architect: NSPJ

189 units. 372 parking spaces. 10,000 sqft retail. 

Notable features: Project bridges over main street.

Ground Floor

More renderings

KC Commercial Realty Group, Complete LLC, and EPC plans to build a six-story apartment community with about 190 market-rate units above 12,000 square feet of ground-floor retail, plus 372 spaces of structured parking. 

EPC intends to move "full-speed ahead" through the city's predevelopment process; once approved, construction is expected to last roughly 20 months, McKeen said. 

https://www.bizjournals.com/kansascity/news/2020/12/15/5th-main-apartments-rfp-epc-flaherty-collins.html

Just say "No" to buildings spanning streets.

I’m less opposed to the idea when the street in question has been rendered to a glorified cul de sac by the highway


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

See, I always feel like buildings connected by interior bridges mean you've made it into the bigs. I've loved the darn things since I was a little kid.  I take it you're not a fan of Florence's Vasari Corridor?

^I suppose it's a matter of preference. I'm a fan of the feeling of density they help to create: bridges over bridges over bridges. Lack of natural light is a feature, not a bug. I might be the one guy on this forum that mourned the St. Louis Center bridges. (Which, to be fair, is mostly mourning the mall, not the bridges. I used to thoroughly enjoy that place.) Now, this business in Kansas City isn't likely to contribute to the sort of layered madness of Neo Tokyo or Trantor, but it still says to me "I'm willing to pay the expense to make this space above you productive" while still admitting the need for commerce to pass through at ground level. That bespeaks a certain busyness; when even the air has development value.

I'll take it. 
You'll pass.

 Hopefully we can still be friends at the end of the day.

The Los Angeles County Museum of Art is currently building a new building which will span Wilshire Blvd. The plan has lots of opposition, and not just because it will (allegedly) spoil the view down an iconic boulevard. 

https://news.artnet.com/market/lacma-ex ... is-1822221

Here are renderings and elevations of LuxLiving's (SoHo, McKenzie, Hudson, Chelsea, Steelyard, etc) Crossroads project. 228 apartments. 209 parking spaces.

CityScene KC Story: https://cityscenekc.com/st-louis-develo ... rossroads/

Casino KC (Formerly Isle of Capri):

Bally's is pursuing the redevelopment of the Isle of Capri Casino along the Missouri River near downtown KC. The $61 million first phase includes the addition of a 36,000 sqft retail/dining/entrance building and the renovation of the existing casino. A new amphitheater will be constructed at the Southwest corner of the large surface lot. This phase is expected to start in early spring.

Future phases include a 7 story, 150 room casino hotel and new parking garage.  Drawings show a future extension of the KC Streetcar under the Kit Bond bridge to a new terminus. Procurement documents for the Berkley Streetcar Extension released earlier this month by KCATA included a potential contract amendment for a further extension to the casino.


Rendering of the new retail+dining building.



New area plan. Note streetcar extension under Bond Bridge.

Neo-Googie?