March 2024 City Scoop: Kansas City

City Grill

Jeff Blaesing
Senior Vice President and Kansas City Office Lead
JE Dunn

Marking 100 years in business in 2024, JE Dunn has a lot to celebrate, including a thriving construction industry in Kansas City, Blaesing says.

There is buzz around a potential new Royals baseball stadium to move to the downtown area as well as renovations to the Kansas City Chiefs Arrowhead Stadium, he says. These projects are reliant on a vote from Jackson County taxpayers in April to help fund them through a sales tax initiative.

Attention on downtown development continues with funding in progress for a “deck” with a park and walkways to be constructed over Interstate 670, which will connect the downtown to the Crossroads districts, he says. There are also big plans at 47th and Rainbow where the University of Kansas is planning a Cancer Research Building, while the University of Kansas Medical Center is planning an expansion. Multifamily housing continues to be active. Hot spots are sprinkled throughout the downtown and in the Crossroads District as well as along the riverfront. The expansion of the KC Main Street Car Line will continue to drive urban development, he adds.

Some large projects that JE Dunn is constructing include the $300 million American Royal Complex, the $271 million Jackson County Detention Center.

We have seen an increase in high-rise/adaptive reuse projects, along with potential redevelopments around the current and future streetcar routes. There is a push to get projects started and completed by the 2026 World Cup. Private Public Partnerships (P3) methods are becoming more common within municipal and institutional work. Some developers in Kansas City are starting to pivot toward non-traditional markets, such as in the industrial space.

The construction market is currently busy driven by large mega projects in manufacturing and data centers. These projects are affecting the labor force and trade partner capacity. Construction escalation has returned to pre-pandemic levels, but we do not expect prices to go down. The market is forecasted to remain strong; procurement of certain materials and equipment must be procured earlier in the project life cycle to meet schedule requirements.

Kansas City adopted the 2021 Energy code that went into effect in September 2023. Projects currently being submitted for review are subject to this new code. The Air Leakage commissioning requirement, how it is procured, performed and the results produced will require new processes and procedural lessons for the many parties involved. Large industrial projects are continuing to identify Kansas City as a viable region due to available state incentives and power/water availability.

Off-Site Manufacturing (OSM) and multi-trade prefabrication are two major ways JE Dunn is mitigating labor shortage in the market. We take great care in the planning of construction schedules with labor analyses and facilitate in-depth reviews with trade partners to ensure capacity, engagement, and support of workforce development programs.

JE Dunn and Monarch Build joined forces to oversee the construction of the revolutionary CPKC KC Current Stadium. This game-changing $117 million project – the world’s first-ever stadium exclusively dedicated to a women’s professional sports team – is poised to reshape the global landscape of women’s sports.

Constructed for the KC Current, a National Women’s Soccer League (NWSL) team since 2021, the CPKC Stadium embodies Kansas City’s sporting spirit. With a seating capacity of 11,500, it heralds a new era for women’s sports, creating waves of excitement globally.

JE Dunn Construction was founded in 1924 in Kansas City and is currently underway with celebrating its Centennial anniversary throughout 2024.