The Power and Light District in Kansas City is the newest and hottest territory in the Midwest. The district features several great Kansas City restaurants, nightclubs, stores, hotels and even a dueling pianos bar.
The P&L District is located in downtown Kansas City on 13th and Grand directly across from The Sprint Center. It is basically a large courtyard that is heated and has a large stage featuring National bands as well as local Kansas City bands on the weekends. The courtyard is surrounded on all sides by nightclubs - kind of like a football stadium where the field is the outdoor courtyard and the stands would be the indoor / outdoor nightclubs - if you can picture that.
The Kansas City real estate market slightly overestimated the popularity of the Power and Light District. Several condos were built around the area and they now lie vacant. Kansas City was voted the number one abandoned city in 2009 as a result of the over-anticipation of the power and light district popularity. Kansas City is trying very hard to be a swank, pop culture city, but it is and always will be a simple cow town where folks like to live in the suburbs, go out to eat, make babies and basically not buy condos.
The KC P&L District has come under a lot of scrutiny lately due to their racist dress code. When the district first opened, several black people complained that the dress code was geared to keep black people out. Then, mysteriously, all of the security guards at the power and light district were suddenly replaced by black men dressed like pimps. I think that Cordish group (the owners of power and light) thought that if they placed black security guards dressed up in stylish suits at the gates then the blacks couldn't complain about being turned away by their own kind. Pretty sneaky - but we caught it. In Cordish's defence, our group was also denied entry due to our clothes (we had just finished a round of golf and had on Adidas wear).
For the most part, the Kansas City power and light district is a tourist attraction mostly frequented by rural white trash and convention-looking white collar hotel stayers, but it is still a lot of fun and a great addition to the Kansas City community.
Adam Blue, CEO
Adam Blue Productions
Kansas City, Missouri
USA
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