On the Plaza and the proposed new building

I thought I might avoid this entry but I just can't. I can't help but write on how monumentally stupid and short-sighted it is for Highwoods Properties and the Polsinelli-Shughart Law Firm to propose tearing down one of the original, landmark Plaza buildings, in order to build a new, contemporary one that fits their needs. At least when the Lockton Companies built theirs they a) built it on an otherwise barren property and b) put one up that matched, in style, the mediteranean/Spanish style of the rest of the Plaza. The fact is, the Plaza still works, as a retail and restaurant destination right now, in spite of the fact that a huge quantity of the stores and spaces on it are utterly empty right now. And do you know why it works? It works because JC Nichols put up good, solid, one-style architecture and so created a destination. It only still works because it has good architecture--good "bones", so to speak--and so, feels like we've really gone somewhere, when we do go down there. What other area or place in town does that? Downtown? Decidedly not. Oak Park Mall? Please. No, the answer is no. The fact is, there is no other one area in town that is built the way places used to be built like this and that is the Country Club Plaza. For Highwoods and Polsinelli to now propose the beginning of what is surely the further dismantling of the Plaza is tremedously short-sighted and empty. If they want this building, find another site, please, ladies and gentlemen. But the fact is, this go-round, they know better than to ask for TIF money to create this debacle and it's all their own, private money. I'm afraid it looks as though it really will go through---unless Kansas Citians truly raise hell about it. I hope we're not all so poor that we don't have time to do just that--protest so much the plans are changed. Note to Polsinelli-Shughart: can't you just, please, make the "West Edge" project work for you? Please?? Links to related posts: http://www.kansascity.com/2010/08/19/2162001/office-building-planned-in-heart.html http://www.kansascity.com/2010/08/20/2164294/irate-plaza-fans-object-to-law.html