Missed this a week ago, but there is currently a little trouble over at the Bannister Mall site. Due to the economy as a whole right now, which is scaring off banks from financing and businesses from expanding and moving, the entire project at the Bannister site is stalled, including the Wizards stadium. While the documentation for state tax credits that have been approved they have not been finalized. And Lane4 is talking with the city about how to move things along faster. The project isn't being shelved, and the plan is to still have the Wizards stadium there, but right now things are in a bit of a holding pattern.
KC city councilman, John Sharp makes a good point in the article saying that the Wizards stadium may have to be built first to help spur on the rest of the development as a whole. We'll see what happens, but I wouldn't start with the "Will the Wizards move?" talk just yet. This is going to be an issue anywhere in the US right now, places aren't wanting to spend money in this down economy and getting "fun" things built like stadiums aren't high on the priority list at the moment.
on NPR maybe a month or so ago they had a guy on that was very knowledgeable about projects about KC and I emailed in about the stadium... He said that they were having trouble getting retail to commit (no suprize, basically the story of all the projects around the city outside of a couple) but that the saving grace would be/might be that 2 of the owners of OnGoal own a company that does something with electronic medical record stuff and that they were doing very well and might move their office down to site which would in turn give retailers a base to sell to... Who knows though, just what "the radio" was saying.
ReplyDeleteYes, two of the owners are owners for Cerner. They've already moved part of their office down to that area. The hope is they'd move more. It's definitely a bonus in the team's favor.
ReplyDeletePulling for KC to get that stadium. Renderings look great!
ReplyDelete