A new study says the Royals’ planned downtown stadium could send a fresh wave of traffic into Kansas City’s core, with projections calling for 1 million additional annual visits to downtown businesses once the project is up and running.
The Hunden Partners report, commissioned by the city, arrives as Kansas City’s Finance, Governance and Public Safety prepares to debate a special tax district around the stadium on Tuesday. The study says the ballpark and its surrounding development could generate $1.4 billion in taxes over the next 30 years in the proposed “stadium impact area.”
That area would cover roughly four square miles, stretching from the South loop to 31st Street and from State Line out to Brooklyn Avenue. Of the projected tax haul, about $460 million would come from sales at the stadium itself.
Royals owner John Sherman used the team’s end-of-season media availability Monday to cast the project as a major turning point.
“This project is transformational for fans, players and community,” Sherman said.
The new stadium, along with a mixed-use entertainment district, is slated to open near Crown Center in 2030 in partnership with Hallmark Cards. Sherman also brushed aside concerns that an April election on whether future venues with more than 2500 seats should be put up for a public vote could affect the plan.
“I would tell you that it’s not traditional that economic development projects, particularly the way this one is financed, would go to a public vote,” Sherman said.
He pointed to the opening of the T-Mobile Center, formerly Sprint Center, as an example of a project that changed the city in ways few could have predicted.
“It’s led to things I don’t think we could have imagined 20 years ago, the NFL draft, a new airport, the KC Current stadium along the riverfront,” Sherman said, adding the World Cup then put Kansas City on a whole new level.
The Hunden Partners study also looked back at the effect of T-Mobile Center on nearby businesses and compared attendance and consumer spending trends after new baseball stadiums opened in similar markets. Its findings suggest hotels were among the biggest winners around T-Mobile, with about 30 percent of visitors traveling 100 miles or more.
For the Royals’ proposed ballpark, the report projects an average of 425,000 additional fans and says about 60 percent of the extra downtown visits would go to bars and restaurants.
“To have baseball with 81 nights a year and the other opportunities that have been created by if you can do a mixed-use development it creates so much vibrancy and energy around the ballpark.”
Sherman said he expects about 4,000 fans each night to walk or bike to the stadium, with thousands more using the streetcar, which he believes would create even more business for nearby establishments.
Asked by FOX4 whether a possible Major League Baseball work stoppage could affect the team’s finances or the stadium timeline, Sherman said the club has contingency plans in place and that a stoppage would not change construction plans. Demolition of some buildings in the Crown Center area is set to begin in the spring of 2027.
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