Downtown Arts Campus

Supporters of the proposed downtown University of Missouri-Kansas City campus for the arts have enlisted Warren Erdman, a savvy veteran of Missouri politics, to lead the lobbying effort for $48 million in matching state funds.

“Warren has been fantastically supportive since early on,” says Dean Peter Witte of the UMKC Conservatory of Music and Dance.

“His understanding of the University of Missouri System and his reputation in the State Legislature are great assets.”

A proposed $227 million extension of Kansas City’s streetcar line could add nearly four miles to the current route.

The Kansas City Regional Transit Alliance – a citizens’ group not affiliated with the city or the KC Streetcar Authority – filed a petition in Jackson County Court Wednesday to fund an expansion of the current line with a new taxing district along Main Street.

“You think about the shops we have here,” UMKC Chancellor Leo Morton said Thursday morning outside the Colonial Shops on 51st Street. “You think about the Plaza. You think about the Nelson art gallery.”

Leaders at the University of Missouri-Kansas City have announced $5.6 million in additional gifts for the Conservatory of Music and Dance and its planned Downtown Campus for the Arts.

That puts the fundraising total above $30 million, for a project whose first phase is estimated to cost $96 million. Once the university has raised $48 million in private funds, it will approach the state of Missouri for matching funds.

The University of Missouri-Kansas City has chosen a team of architects to design the first phase of its proposed downtown arts campus.

The winning team is the duo of Kansas City’s Helix Architecture and Design and the Minneapolis-based HGA.

The selection comes after a competition last week where five teams participated in a three-day design session and presented their concepts to the public on Sunday. More than 200 people attended.

Five architect teams are on the short list to design the first phase of the University of Missouri-Kansas City’s proposed downtown arts campus.

The finalists include Kansas City-based firms BNIM, el dorado, Helix, Hoefer Wysocki and International Architect Atelier, each teamed with national architecture firms. 

The initial stage of the project calls for relocating the UMKC Conservatory of Music and Dance -- students, faculty, classes, and most performances -- to the Crossroads Arts District. 

The headline of a recent editorial in The Kansas City Star about downtown Kansas City, Missouri declared: "A decade later, downtown has stronger heartbeat."