Lots going on downtown these days.</p><p>But nine summers ago, KC&rsquo;s central business district was not happening.</p><p>It took an auto show or a lawn and garden fair to get people downtown.</p><p>Or, as we learned in the summer of 2000, you could also draw folks in to see giant pieces of underwear hanging from the lampposts.</p><p>Bras, briefs and boxers hanging from wires tied to the streetlights at 12th and Central. Some will remember that spectacle. And how people would point and say, &ldquo;Darned if that isn&rsquo;t some big underwear.&rdquo;</p><p>Or &ldquo;You gotta be kidding me &mdash; that&rsquo;s art?&rdquo;</p><p>Big underpants on lampposts. Just one of the half-dozen pieces of provocative art that kicked off the inaugural Avenue of the Arts displays along Central Avenue.</p><p>&ldquo;People still talk about that one,&rdquo; said Porter Arneill, Kansas City public arts director.</p><p>I&rsquo;m not so sure regular folks are talking as much about this summertime&rsquo;s Avenue of the Arts show as they did back then. Maybe it&rsquo;s because there isn&rsquo;t anything all that outrageous.</p><p>Still, if you find yourself downtown between now and the first of September, take a stroll along Central to see this year&rsquo;s installation.</p><p>I did the other day.</p><p>Starting at 16th Street, where the new Performing Arts Center is taking shape &mdash; wow, how cool is that going to be &mdash; I checked out the first sculpture, by Reilly Hoffman, called &ldquo;transfiguration of St. Bartholomew,&rdquo; and made my way north.</p><p>Three blocks later, you encounter Peregrine Honig&rsquo;s playful 2002 piece called &ldquo;Moo Cow.&rdquo; Turn the wheel on the heavy steel piece and hear a cow.</p><p>Surprisingly, few if any of the 10 artworks have been vandalized. Surely someone by now would have messed with the waterfall made of plastic water bottles at Barney Allis Plaza.</p><p>Or a decal on the wall of the Folly Theater of a guy slipping on a banana peel, but it was still intact when I saw it.</p><p>Too bad that all that remains of a sculpture called &ldquo;Neophon Zelatron&rdquo; at the Lyric Theatre is two brown patches where it once sat on the front lawn. Artist Colin Leipelt told me that he took it down because it didn&rsquo;t stand up to wind, weather and the lawn-mowing crews.</p><p>Another artist, Laura DeAngelis, plans to install a piece called &ldquo;Conjoined&rdquo; near a couple of other quirky pieces at Barney Allis.</p><p>&ldquo;It&rsquo;s a stage set,&rdquo; Arneill said. &ldquo;There&rsquo;s a dining room table, and wedding cake, and a two-headed wolf on top of it.&rdquo;</p><p>No underwear? Well, it still sounds weird enough. If you want to know more, go to <a href="http://www.kcmo.org/cimo.nsf/web/avenue">www.kcmo.org/cimo.nsf/web/avenue</a>.</p><p>Or take a walk downtown when you get a chance. Best thing about it, it&rsquo;s free.