Downtown KC showing great improvement — but how great?

By JEFFREY SPIVAK

The Kansas City Star

Breaking News

Just looking around downtown Kansas City, it’s hard not to be proud. A cool-looking arena. A hopping entertainment district. Art galleries galore.

We all know downtown is better, but how much better?

The Kansas City Star set out to measure downtown’s progress since the dawn of the decade. The upshot: The progress has been good, but not as good as you might think — and not enough to keep up with downtown revivals in some similar-sized cities such as Denver, Charlotte and Nashville.

Beginning today, The Star launches a three-day series that charts Kansas City’s downtown comeback, compares it to recoveries elsewhere and explores what it needs to continue its momentum. This effort follows up the newspaper’s 2002 series, “Mending Our Broken Heart,” at right, which chronicled how downtown was failing.

Today we present a report card on downtown’s performance this decade. It encompasses 30 statistical trends, covering population, jobs, crime, restaurants, even public perceptions.

Of the 30 indicators, downtown progressed in 19. That’s something to crow about. But not everything is rosy.

Posted on Sat, May. 17, 2008 10:15 PM

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