Tag: Downtown Wichita revitalization

  • Downtown Wichita proposals not available to citizens

    As part of Wichita’s downtown revitalization effort, city leaders decided to hire a planning firm. Four firms have been selected as finalists, and a committee is in the process of evaluating their proposals. Whether or not you think this planning process is wise — and I happen to think it is not — it seems…

  • At Wichita city council, special pleading of selfish interests

    At yesterday’s meeting of the the Wichita City Council, a matter was presented to the council that provided an illustration of basic economic principles that are foreign to the council.

  • In Wichita, waiving guidelines makes for bad policy

    I am here to ask you to deny the request for special assessment financing for the Lofts at St. Francis homeowners association to make repairs to their building. I’ve spoken to this council about how the facade improvement program, in general, is bad public policy. In this case, it’s bad public policy compounded by the…

  • Wichita special assessments for repairs is bad policy

    At Tuesday’s meeting of the Wichita City Council, a privately-owned condominium association is seeking special assessment financing to make repairs to its building. In order for the association to succeed in its request, the council will have to waive two guidelines of Wichita’s facade improvement program.

  • Wichita downtown revitalization discussed on Kansas Week

    Bob Weeks discusses planning for downtown Wichita revitalization and what he learned on his trip to the Platinum Triangle in Anaheim, California. Host Tim Brown and guest Randy Brown also appear. From the KPTS Television show Kansas Week, August 14, 2009.

  • Wichita’s getting ready to plan

    The danger we face is that Wichita’s plan will end up like almost all other urban plans — a top-down effort micromanaged by politicians and bureaucrats, people whose incentives are all wrong. We already have the structure in place, with our mayor promoting the plan for downtown as his signature achievement, and a tax-supported downtown…

  • Light rail not good for Wichita

    A recent letter in the Wichita Eagle by Alden Wilner of Bel Aire worries that “flat, dusty and hot” parking lots in the neighborhood of the Intrust Bank Arena (formerly known as the downtown Wichita arena) in downtown Wichita will hamper downtown revitalization. I don’t know if this claim is true or not, but I…