Best Urban Renewal

In some ways, Gillham Road has always struck us as one of Kansas City's quintessential streets. The curvy drive leads past lovely parks and beautiful homes ... to a cluster of fast-food restaurants and auto-parts shops before descending into a canyon of blight just south of downtown. That is why we're so jazzed about Gillham Row, a construction project that has used city tax breaks to reclaim the shell of one historic building and is putting up three buildings from scratch in an effort to rebuild the neighborhood north of 31st Street. Urban Coeur, the development company of John Hoffman, Vincent Gauthier and Larry Maxfield, was able to wrest some of the property from Crown Center's stockpile for future development. Listing agent Christina Boveri says sales of the condominiums have gone well, and she's lined up Coffee Girls to provide human fuel from an old gas station. Other developers have joined the party, and we hope the Gillham corridor will become part of a Kansas City that breathes new life into its old neighborhoods.