Union Station and downtown KC were thriving in the 1950s. This project changed all that
Editor’s Note: Past|Present is a new video series from The Star that travels through time to show how scenes Kansas City depicted in vintage postcards look today. Have a postcard you’d like to share with our team? Tell us about it here.
The most intriguing part of this postcard picturing Kansas City’s skyline in the mid-1950s is something you can’t see. Because it hadn’t been built yet.
That’s the Downtown Loop, the highway system that was about to change a great many things in this typical American city.
More about that in a moment.
In this view from Liberty Memorial, Union Station commands our attention. Not only for its size but for the many tracks and “sheds” that were still feeding passengers and freight through it in large amounts.
In the blocks between Union Station and downtown, now known as the Crossroads District, the most visible logo belongs to TWA. The airline built its headquarters on Baltimore Avenue in 1956. The company moved to New York in 1964.
Jenkins Music, advertised prominently on a billboard just north of the station, didn’t survive the 70s.
In the postcard, the Kansas City Power & Light Building stands like the Art Deco beacon it is. But in less than twenty years it would be stranded on an island surrounded by concrete, with cars whizzing by on their way out of downtown more often than in.
The loop started with a massive demolition project that cleared houses and stores on the north side of downtown in 1953. The final stretch was completed on the west side in 1972.
In recent years, various proposals to alter the road system have been brought forth. One calls for building a massive urban park over the freeway’s southern edge-- the South Loop Link--in an attempt to re-establish some of the geographic continuity captured in the postcard.
Looking for more Kansas City history?
A downtown player early on, the Jenkins Music Company had quite a ride
Bet you didn’t know about these road races that were held in downtown KC
Nearing 100 now, the Kansas City Power & Light Building still dazzles
This story was originally published August 30, 2023 at 5:30 AM.