Urgent sidewalk needs in south KC

By John Sharp

While members of the large crowd of south Kansas City residents that attended the June 16 hearing by 5th City Council District representatives of the KCMO Public Improvements Advisory Committee (PIAC) requested funding for a variety of projects such as street and park improvements, requests for sidewalk installations to prevent children and adults from being forced to walk on often heavily traveled city streets far outweighed other requests.

The need for sidewalk installations is much higher in many parts of south Kansas City than in older parts of the city because many subdivisions in our area were constructed before the areas were annexed by the city, and developers were not required to install sidewalks when constructing subdivisions so many didn’t.

There also are parts of south Kansas City where there are gaps in sidewalks, apparently caused by inadequate funding for sidewalk projects, that don’t appear to make any sense.

In central parts of KCMO most requests for sidewalk funding are for sidewalk repairs, not installations, since sidewalks there were installed when those areas were developed.

Our area’s lack of sidewalks is a serious life safety issue! As an example, I have personally witnessed two incidents when pedestrians in the street where there were no sidewalks were almost hit by speeding vehicles that likely would have caused death or serious injury, both on East 107th St. near my home that draws frequent pedestrian traffic walking to the 7-Eleven, Burger King, other shops and the bus stop on Blue Ridge Blvd.

In one case a lady in a motorized wheelchair was on 107th east of Blue Ridge near dusk. I saw a dump truck right in front of me suddenly swerve completely into the other lane of traffic barely missing the lady.

In the other case two children were walking in the street west of Blue Ridge when a speeding eastbound car swerved into the westbound lane of traffic at the last second to avoid hitting them nearly hitting my car head on.

Since then, sidewalks finally have been constructed all along the north side of 107th St. east of Blue Ridge, but on the west side of Blue Ridge to its intersection with Hillcrest Rd. there are only short stretches of sidewalks on the south side of the street that strangely stop in the middle of blocks between houses, not even at intersections.

I submitted a request for PIAC funding to close this sidewalk gap on 107th St. which I noted could be done in phases if necessary due to lack of funds. I also requested funding for a tall retaining wall on the south side of the street underneath the railroad overpass to provide room for construction of a sidewalk under the overpass to prevent pedestrians from being forced to walk in the street underneath the overpass.

A similar seemingly senseless gap in sidewalks exists on a nearby stretch of the heavily traveled Red Bridge Rd. which has sidewalks on the north side of the street from Blue Ridge west to Beacon, but no sidewalks from Beacon to Hillcrest Rd. forcing the many people walking to the very busy McDonalds and Taco Bell at the street’s intersection with Hillcrest Rd. to walk in the street or on the shoulder putting them at risk from speeding vehicles.

And a similar overpass problem for pedestrians including children walking to the nearby Bay Waterpark exists on Longview Rd. where bad erosion from around the railroad tracks covers the sidewalk on the north side of Longview Rd. with thick layers of mud during heavy rains causing pedestrians to walk in the street which is also heavily traveled. A short retaining wall on both sides of the overpass would be a relatively inexpensive solution to this problem.

There will be two more PIAC hearings to hear requests for public improvements later this summer for the two Council districts that between them cover all of south Kansas City.

The next 6th District PIAC hearing for the western portion of south Kansas City will be at 6 p.m. Monday, August 4, at the Plaza Branch of the Kansas City Public Library, and the next 5th District hearing for the eastern portion of south Kansas City will be at 6 p.m. August 18 at Southeast Community Center.

Persons may also request PIAC application forms by calling 816-513-1062 or emailing piac@kcmo.org, and the deadline for receiving applications is August 31. It is wise to attend a PIAC hearing to explain the need for a project since there are always more requests for PIAC funding than available money.

PIAC makes recommendations to the Mayor and City Council which are almost always followed, and this year’s approved recommendations will be included in the city’s next fiscal year budget starting May 1, 2026, but since projects need to have final designs and bids taken, it is usually the following fiscal year before work can actually get started for all but the simplest projects.

Learn more about PIAC at www.kcmo.gov.