Like many residents of this region, Dave Schukai is suburban through and through. He lives in south Overland Park, works in Merriam and typically sticks around Johnson County on weekends.</p><p>But now he finds himself drawn more often to downtown Kansas City.</p><p>He recently purchased season tickets to the Kansas City Symphony for his family. He did it for the music, of course. But he also did it because he wants to be in line for seats at the upcoming performing arts center downtown and because he wants his wife and children to experience the new vitality downtown.</p><p>&#8220;Everything going on downtown is definitely an incentive to attend concerts,&#8221; said Schukai, a partner in BRR Architecture. &#8220;Now, more than ever, it&#8217;s a destination, and you can do more before and after a show and enjoy yourself.&#8221;</p><p>In many ways, people are the key benchmark in downtown&#8217;s reversal of fortune, and downtown is now drawing more of them &#8212; more residents, more workers, even more folks attending cultural events like the symphony.</p><p>In analyzing downtown&#8217;s changes this decade, <em>The Star </em>compiled 30 statistical measures divided into three categories: people, business and quality of life. In the people category, seven out of 10 measures show a positive trend &#8212; that&#8217;s 70 percent.</p><p>Since the beginning of the decade, downtown&#8217;s population has jumped an estimated 39 percent. Housing resale prices have surged 34 percent. And attendance at the biggest cultural institutions has grown 10 percent.</p><p>Along with that, many more urban and suburban residents feel better about downtown. In polls conducted for <em>The Star </em>this decade, the proportion of area respondents who think downtown&#8217;s image reflects positively on the metropolitan area has shot up from 35 percent six years ago to 48 percent this year.</p><p>&#8220;The general perception is, there are more people downtown and it&#8217;s a safe and comfortable place to be,&#8221; said Frank Byrne, executive director of the symphony, which performs at the Lyric Theatre. &#8220;It inspires people to come who might not have before.&#8221;</p><p>The role of downtown has now changed, from strictly an office and business core to more of an entertainment destination and urbane neighborhood. Formerly forlorn high-rises, such as the long-gutted Vista Del Rio on Admiral Boulevard, were converted to condominiums. In a matter of just a few years, new residential districts formed &#8212; around the new public library, throughout the Crossroads and along Gillham Road.</p><p>&#8220;There&#8217;s been a pent-up demand that was untapped for an urban, maintenance-free lifestyle,&#8221; said Christina Boveri, a real estate broker who publishes an urban living magazine.</p><p>Still, not everyone is coming back downtown. One example: families with children. Another, which may come as a surprise: tourists.</p><p><em>The Star</em>&#8217;s analysis shows hotel stays downtown are down so far this decade, and overnight stays for conventions are down 42 percent, despite Bartle Hall&#8217;s continued expansion. These declines reflect the city&#8217;s decades-long slide as a convention site. Even the opening of downtown&#8217;s newest tourist magnets, the Power &amp; Light District and the Sprint Center, hasn&#8217;t reversed the trend &#8212; yet.</p><p>&#8220;If you&#8217;re a convention planner, why would you book in 2007 when you can book in a later year and everything&#8217;s ready?&#8221; observed Rick Hughes, president of the Kansas City Convention &amp; Visitors Association. &#8220;There&#8217;s a bit of a lag (in bookings) waiting for the new facilities.&#8221;