The KC Spirit Playbook (Playbook) is the City of Kansas City, Missouri's first comprehensive plan update in 25 years and will guide the physical development of the city for the next two decades. The Playbook represents a departure from traditional comprehensive planning and is not organized by siloed topic areas but instead by broad inter-connected topic areas using a holistic Future Ready planning approach.
The plan is centered around five Big Ideas including:
- Fostering neighborhoods that accommodate all ages, lifestyles, and incomes by diversifying and densifying housing choices and creating complete communities that facilitate a high quality-of-life
- Creating a physically beautiful city by promoting high-quality design in public spaces, parks, private development, and capital improvements
- Respecting land as a limited resource by balancing outward growth with infill development, preserving natural resources, and developing in an equitable and sustainable manner
- Maximizing connections and mobility options by bridging or eliminating barriers and creating new physical connections and a robust multimodal transportation system
- Creating a future-proofed city by better anticipating and reacting to new technologies and evolving conditions
Public Involvement, Equity Focus
Feedback from the public was critical to the project. WSP led 12 public meetings and multiple other stakeholder meetings. These meetings were conducted virtually because of the COVID-19 pandemic, and many interactive tools like Mentimeter and Mural were used to drive participation. Nearly 1,000 residents attended these meetings over the course of the project, providing valuable feedback and creating momentum for the plan recommendations.
In addition to helping develop the Big Ideas, WSP assisted the city with developing twenty-one objectives where most of the plan’s content resides, including its recommendations. WSP also helped to define five topic areas to act as an organizational tool for the plan. The objectives cover a broad range of policies from Vision Zero and complete streets to sustainability, housing, growth, and neighborhood revitalization. All the elements were viewed through an equity lens to create the Playbook and set city policy in these areas. Promoting equitable outcomes and quality development for all residents is the primary focus of the entire plan.
Community Supported Actions
Within the objectives, WSP worked collaboratively with city staff to develop more than 280 Community Supported Actions (recommendations) that include specific and targeted actions that the city can take to achieve the vision and goals of the plan. All these recommendations are organized into an implementation dashboard where users can quickly and easily identify actions supporting the Big Ideas, Topics, and Goals they are interested in.
The KC Spirit Playbook was adopted unanimously by the Kansas City Council in April 2023. More information on the plan can be found at the KC Playbook website.
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