Strategic Decision-Making Capacity:
Redevelopment and Reinvestment
In 1970, Denver, Minneapolis and Kansas City metropolitan areas had similar growth patterns in their urban areas — declining centers and growing edges.
Population Change by Decade, 1970-2000 |
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Denver |
Minneapolis |
Kansas City |
1970 |
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1970 |
1980 |
1980 |
1980 |
1990 |
1990 |
1990 |
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During the 1970s, Minneapolis, working through the state, passed tax-base sharing and implemented a form of metropolitan government. As a result, the area around their downtown began to grow again in the 1980s and revitalization continued to spread outward in the 1990s.
Percent of Urbanized Area Population
Living in Growing Neighborhoods, 1980-2000
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data in .xls format
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Denver's proportion of population in growing areas actually declined during the 1980s as the metro experienced hard times after the energy bubble burst in the early part of the decade. But the 1990s saw an emphasis on Downtown revitalization and new urbanist development. This allowed Denver to accommodate a significant portion of its growth in existing areas, largely reversing trends there.
Meanwhile, the Kansas City area continues to put most of its energy in new development rather than redevelopment, partially explaining its overbuilding of retail space. As a result of its development priorities, the region largely exhibits the same kind of population growth pattern it did in the 1970s. Pockets of growth are returning to the center — for example, Quality Hill, Beacon Hill, River Market and the Crossroads. But most of the population growth in the urban area has been due not to redevelopment as much as to providing a home to recent immigrants in search of affordable housing.
Dollar Value of Major Downtown Projects
Since 2000 by Year of Completion
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Some evidence points to a reversal of prior trends of disinvestment in older parts of the region. Recently, an increased focus on downtown by decision-makers has resulted in the Sasaki Plan, creation of a Downtown Community Improvement District, loft and condo conversions, the Kansas City Public Library renovation and the Sprint Arena and H&R Block Headquarters in the new Kansas City Live District.
As a result, nearly $4.5 billion in construction has either been completed or is under way in the greater downtown area since 2000. Similar bursts of investment have occurred in the past — Crown Center, Bartle Hall and Kemper Arena in the 1970s; the Vista Hotel (now Marriott), Quality Hill and the office building boom (a 50 percent increase in downtown office space) during the 1980s. The biggest question is whether this boom, unlike prior ones, can be sustained.
Some of the reinvestment has been more organic. For example, the arts district in the Crossroads area grew under the radar for years. Its highly successful First Friday events created visibility and development momentum that appears to be self-sustaining.
Percent Change in Real Housing Values, 1990-2000
Magnification of the Central Part of the Kansas City Metro
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In addition, during the 1990s the value of housing rose fastest in many urban core and first suburb areas, rather than in the developing suburbs as in decades past. This is the result of many things — new wealth as the stock market boomed, a change in tax laws that no longer penalized buying a smaller house and renovating it, and an aging population no longer in need of big houses and yards.
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