Huge Warehouses being built in KC

All around the Kansas City metro area in places like Olathe, Cameron and Gardner, a phenomenon is in full swing. Companies are building large warehouses, distribution hubs of Jurassic proportions. Since May of 2006, 2.7 million square feet of new warehouse space has been announced within the 18-county region in Missouri and Kansas, with companies like Musician’s Friend, Pacific Sunwear, Case New Holland, Federal Express, American Eagle and Medline at the forefront of this development.

In the 1990s Kansas City’s warehouses and land were overlooked. Cities like Memphis, Columbus, Indianapolis, Chicago and Atlanta got the bulk of corporate attention. Some may say their success has worked against them as they are now congested. Kansas City remained a secret, until now. David Hinchman, first vice president of CB Richard Ellis has been a longtime champion of Kansas City logistics capabilities and knew growth was inevitable.
“The stars are lining up for Kansas City,” he beams. “The primary reason
is that Kansas City is in the center of the U.S. and enjoys amazing
transportation amenities.”
“We are going to be an increasingly important center for international logistics. KCKC is at the convergence of history and geography,” says Bob
Marcusse, president and CEO of the Kansas City Area Development Council.
Optimism abounds, but Kansas City harbors no illusion that it can compete with areas with much higher population densities.
“We’ve moved into a solid second-tier market,” says Hinchman. “Four class-one railroads make Kansas City the number two rail center in the U.S. We have four interstates (I-70, I-35, I-29, I-49) and virtually five with U.S. 71, which goes through a town called Bentonville.”

Experts say the reasons for the spike in interest in Kansas City are numerous. For one, truckers are now mandated to rest after a certain amount of time, which makes a more central warehouse desirable.

KC also boasts the title of #1 in rail/train shipping and has the largest UNDERGROUND warehouse space in the WORLD!

http://www.kcsmartport.com/sec_news/media/documents/Jurassic-SizedStorage.pdf