It looks like the city fathers of Springfield, Missouri, are pretty earnest in redeveloping the moribund Kearney Street corridor: They’re tearing down the closed Springfield Inn motel to make way for it.
According to KY3 in Springfield, bulldozers soon will raze that property to bring in new construction of retail stores to revitalize the area, though developers did not say what is going to be built there.
A perusal of online review sites indicates the motel closed about a month ago, perhaps longer, and suffered from slipshod management. I’ve found little information about the motel’s history, other than it previously was an America’s Best Value Inn.
The station reports many storefronts along that alignment of Route 66 stand empty or aging, with a proliferation of fast-food restaurants. Redevelopment has begun on the corridor’s west side at the Kansas Expressway and now on the east side at Glenstone Avenue, also a path for Route 66.
Sarah Kerner, Springfield’s director of economic development, said the Kearney Street plan took root in 2017.
The initial Kearney Street Corridor Study revealed the demand for more services from people living on this side of town. The area has the potential to capture additional retail sales available from $95 million in unmet household demand in trade around the area.
“Look, we live on the northside of town but our money spends just the same as the south siders. We are having to drive to the southside to shop but it would be great if we could do it on the northside,” said Kerner referring to comments gathered during the study process.
Kearney Street remains a prominent Route 66 alignment known as a car-cruising Mecca during the 1970s and ’80s — at least until the city cracked down on it. Ironically, Springfield in 2017 welcomed back cruising on Kearney during the summer months.
The Kearney Street project is being closely watched by other cities that want to revitalize downtrodden sections of Route 66.
(Excerpted image from Google Street View of the Springfield Inn in Springfield, Missouri)
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