Photo credit: John English/Journal World
A September 2024 photo shows construction on the University of Kansas’ football stadium.
Future development around the University of Kansas’ football stadium, currently undergoing a partial $450 million renovation to add a conference center and other amenities, has recently become more complicated.
Local governments may soon be asked to ease some of those complexities by offering financial incentives for the 11th and Mississippi Streets project.
“It’s going to take the whole community working together to get this done,” University of Kansas President Douglas Girod said in a brief interview with the Journal-World.
As a reminder, the development is being touted as the Kansas Gateway Project: The university wants to build hotels, restaurants and retail around the stadium to attract conventioneers and others to come and spend money in Lawrence, even when there aren’t any Kansas football games.
The project is currently underway in a big way: The west side of David Booth Kansas Memorial Stadium has been demolished and is currently being rebuilt while the University of Kansas plays its home football games in Kansas City, and a conference center capable of hosting events for up to 1,000 people is being constructed at the north end of the stadium.
But no improvements have been made to the east side of the stadium, where the $448 million project essentially renovates half the stadium and builds a conference center.
Instead, the university has largely paused renovations on the east side, said it has no timetable for completing the renovations and acknowledged it doesn’t have enough donations or other funding to begin the project.
Rather, the next phase of the project is focused on finding a private partner to build a hotel on the east side of the stadium adjacent to the conference center, which KU and other industry officials say is essential to the success of the conference center under construction.
Now a new problem has arisen: The developers have told KU that they can’t build a hotel or any other facility on the east side of the stadium until the renovations on that side are actually completed.
“That’s something we’ve learned through negotiations with developers,” Girod said, “and we didn’t realize that until very recently. We can’t wait for the stadium to be built because then nothing will ever get done.”
The reason the renovations must come first is space: Renovating the east side of the stadium would involve moving the seats 80 to 100 feet to the west, said Jeff DeWitt, Kansas’ chief financial officer, who is also involved in the discussions. Those extra 80 to 100 feet of space would allow hotels, retail stores, restaurants, parking and other facilities to be built on the east side.
DeWitt said this was surprising news for Kansas University officials.
“I had never thought about it until the developer saw it,” DeWitt said.
Girod said the exposure was crucial.
“They said, ‘You guys don’t get it. We can’t wait (for the renovations) because nothing is going to get done,'” Girod said of recent discussions with an unnamed development group the University of Kansas is considering as a potential partner.
What happens next will be crucial as well: KU has learned what it needs to do to secure enough space to build the project, but it’s still grappling with what it needs to do to secure enough funding to build the project.
No cost estimates have been released for the east side stadium renovation. It could be less than the west side’s $450 million because the west side project would include a press box, luxury suites and a conference center. The east side project could reach or exceed the $450 million mark if a hotel, restaurants, retail and parking were added to the project. Kansas is hoping a private development group, which it has yet to select, will contribute significantly to the non-stadium portions of the project.
It’s unclear how much developers are actually willing to contribute to the project, but that still raises the question of how Kansas will come up with the money to cover stadium-specific costs. The west side project will be paid for with a combination of donor contributions and new debt from Kansas Athletics, Inc. Kansas has not yet disclosed how much debt the athletics department will have to take on, but Girod previously acknowledged it could be more than $100 million.
As a result, Girod said the university will likely seek financial assistance from local governments, such as the city of Lawrence and Douglas County, but he did not provide details about what the university would seek.
“I think the (financial) part is going to require some incentive work with the city and the county,” Girod said. “We need to understand that better.”
Girod said a key aspect of understanding the overall financial picture for the East Side project has to do with whether it includes a student housing component. Girod said university officials are leaning toward the idea of including a new building for student housing in the Gateway project. That building would be a revenue generator for the project and would likely generate millions of dollars in student housing fees.
The exact size and type of dorms are still being considered by Kansas officials, who DeWitt said expects officials to have answers to those questions by the end of the year.
But key questions remain about parking. Currently, the two largest game-day parking lots are located on the east side of the stadium. The hope is that some sort of parking lot will replace the ones that will be lost. But where and how many spaces will be there are key details that still need to be determined.
Additionally, the university must reach an agreement with a private developer. Girod acknowledged that the university has received one proposal from a developer that it is “very excited about,” but the university has not yet signed a contract with the unnamed company.
DeWitt said it will probably be spring at the earliest before the University of Kansas announces next steps for the project, including ideas about funding and timing.
Girod said a lot of work needs to be done before then. Following the news that stadium renovations must move forward before other work can begin, he said Kansas is actively working on multiple elements, including hotels, retail, student housing, parking and improvements to the east side of the stadium.
“It actually adds five more elements and makes it a lot more complicated, but that’s the right way to do it,” Girod said.
