Want to book a KC hotel room ahead of the Super Bowl parade? Chances are fading fast

One of the biggest parades in the history of Kansas City is in the works.

And if you didn’t book a hotel room close to the action before the Chiefs actually won, you likely won’t be able to now.

Downtown hotels were mostly sold out by Monday, and some have been for weeks, as hordes of fans make plans to descend on downtown Kansas City to attend Wednesday’s celebration for the Kansas City Chiefs, who defeated the San Francisco 49ers Sunday in Super Bowl LIV.

The exact route of the Chiefs’ Super Bowl parade won’t be announced until Tuesday, but officials have said it will start at 11:30 a.m. Wednesday and end with a victory rally in front of Union Station about 1:30 p.m.

While those features of the event broadly follow the precedent of the Royals’ 2015 World Series parade, organizers have pointed out Wednesday will be different. For one thing, it will likely be much colder, with temperatures in the 20s and the possibility of snow on the ground.

There’s no way to know how many people will attend, but crowds are expected to be large. Bus routes have been changed, the KC Streetcar will be shut down, and streets will be shut down or congested all around the parade route.

“People are just overjoyed and that’s putting it mildly,” Visit KC spokeswoman Toni Alexander said.

She offered advice for anyone headed to the parade: “Arrive early (and) pack your patience.”

No vacancy

Rachel Merlo, of Brookside, missed out on the Royals parade and knew she wanted to be downtown for this one.

“I want to be around other fans,” Merlo said. “This is about football but it’s a celebration for Kansas City. This is such a rare experience, of course, and we want to be in the thick of it.”

Merlo had the idea to get a hotel room Thursday morning. By that evening, when she and her husband looked online, they found only one vacancy left: a room at 21c Museum Hotel at 219 W. Ninth Street. They booked it.

By Monday, most everything was full. Three Hampton Inn and Suites locations in Kansas City were all booked for Tuesday night. Other hotels, such as the the Residence Inn Kansas City Downtown and Convention Center, were fully booked well ahead of time.

Jeff Conrade, general manager of the Crossroads Hotel at 2101 Central Street, said demand picked up after the AFC Championship and the hotel sold out before Patrick Mahomes led the Chiefs to their comeback victory in the Super Bowl.

Different from 2015

After the Royals won the World Series in 2015 by beating the New York Mets, crowd later estimated at 255,000 turned out for the festivities.

Drivers trying to get downtown ran into a gridlock. Several abandoned their cars on highway shoulders. There were so many people that internet slowed or didn’t work. Buses were overwhelmed at shuttle pickup spots.

Schools across the metro closed in 2015 and will close again on Wednesday so students, teachers and staff can attend the festivities. The 2015 parade happened on a warm enough November day that some people wore t-shirts.

This time, those who won’t be watching the parade from a comfortable, heated hotel room, should be prepared for an incoming winter storm.

While it shouldn’t rain, there will likely be between 1 to 3 inches of snow. Temperatures will stay cold, in the 20s, and will feel more like the teens when factoring in the wind chill.

Organizers in 2015 had 200 portable toilets in place for the parade. This year, parade organizers will have 700 portable toilets in place — which officials said would be the most ever deployed at any Missouri event.

Also this year the KC Streetcar Authority, which started operating in 2016, announced it will suspend service on Wednesday because of the anticipated crowds. It will resume only when it is safe to do so, officials said.

RideKC will offer free fares on parade day, though service along several routes will be reduced.

RideKC services operated by the Kansas City Area Transportation Authority will run 10 hourly routes. Most will have significant detours, RideKC said on their website. Paratransit service will be heavily impacted, especially to the downtown area.

Routes in Johnson County will not run, but the Special Edition program will still operate.

A KCATA spokeswoman said more details will be announced Tuesday. More information can be found at ridekc.org.

To keep up with details on the parade, attendees can visit the website at chiefsparade.com, sign up for text notifications from AlertKC by texting CHIEFSPARADE to 888-777, or follow the city and the KC Sports Commission on Twitter, according to a news release from the city.

This story was originally published February 3, 2020 at 5:56 PM.