BNIM and the KC Streetcar
BNIM has long been advocating and planning for Kansas City, especially the urban core, from our work on the FOCUS Plan of the late 1990s to Greater Downtown Area Development Plan of the early 2000s to the KC Streetcar Expansion. Each project and plan has been the product of effective community engagement, patient and thoughtful co-creation, and big ideas that have moved our city and region forward.
Earlier today, I was driving on Main Street, enjoying how well the KC Streetcar has been integrated into the urban fabric and improved the condition of our community immensely.
The more I thought about the transformation, the more I reflect on how BNIM has influenced the decision to create this amazing change within the heart of the city and the heart of our region. Tom Nelson, a founder of our practice, was an early advocate for fixed rail transit through Kansas City. He did so as a volunteer, Chair of the City Plan Commission, and as a consultant exploring light rail along Main Street. Although it didn’t happen as hoped during those early evolutions of exploration, these efforts laid the groundwork for the new beautiful transit system that people are using today.
After initial public voting turned down earlier proposals, the Kansas City Design Center (KCDC) organized a competition for light rail transit in Kansas City. A volunteer team of BNIMers won the competition through the thoughtful alignment along Main Street and across the River to North Kansas City and because of the notion of economic development following the rail—as history has shown time and time again. This work turned out to be important to the city in getting to where we are today.
A few years later, the original KC Streetcar line was installed from the City Market to Union Station. Following more success in ridership than expected, BNIM was commissioned by the City and Kansas City Area Transportation Authority (KCATA) to evaluate where the next investment in the Streetcar should be located. BNIM’s study Nextrail KC: Phase II Streetcar Expansion Plan was completed in 2014.
About the same time, BNIM was asked to help again. This time it was to help the city envision how to plan for and encourage appropriate development strategies alongside the investment in KC Streetcar. This work resulted in the Kansas City, Missouri Transit Oriented Development Policy.
As volunteers working with the American Institute of Architects (AIA), American Society of Landscape Architects (ASLA), and Urban Land Institute (ULI), BNIM continued to contribute to early work that guided elected officials and City Staff in stewarding the public realm and space between the buildings. Crafted after the General Service Administration’s (GSA) own Guiding Principles For Federal Architecture written by Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan during the Kennedy Administration, a document entitled Guiding Principles for Civic Design was created for Kansas City to help ensure that the public realm would be nurtured and cared for, as demonstrated through design such as KC Streetcar. The Guiding Principles for Civic Design were as follows:
- Nurture design excellence through leadership by example.
- Create an authentic sense of place.
- Design streets for people.
- Provide quality art in the public realm.
- Sustain and improve urban neighborhoods.
- Respect the integrity and value of the urban fabric.
- Strengthen Kansas City with integrated public transit.
- Respect natural ecosystems and the beauty of the regional landscape.
- Invest strategically in public spaces.
- Practice stewardship for the public realm.
If you decide to ride the KC Streetcar, you will experience a bit of BNIM history along the way, including:
1. Midland Theater Renovation
2. Plaza Colonnade
3. One Petticoat Lane
4. UMKC Cherry Street Garage
5. United Way of Greater Kansas City Headquarters
6. Kansas City Public Library Plaza Branch and Children’s Center
7. Todd Bolender Center for Dance and Creativity
8. MoBank
9. Roy Blunt Luminary Park
10. H&R Block Headquarters (now American Century)
11. 415 Delaware
12. Crown Center Projects
13. One Kansas City Place
14. UMKC Bloch Executive Hall
15. H&R Block Art Space
16. Union Station
17. Children’s Center Campus
18. H&R Block and Bloch Family Foundation Headquarters
I’m excited about the future and how our collective work on projects can help our communities see opportunities for creating places where all people thrive in vibrant, healthy ecosystems.