Contact: Rob Ostrander 202.224.7627 Shana Stribling 202.224.0309
Friday, May 20, 2005

KANSAS CITY, MO U.S. Senator Kit Bond today celebrated the dedication of Kansas City’s new Riverside Levee (L-385), a project Bond praised for helping to protect the city from floods while laying the ground-work for future development.

“Today we celebrate the ‘can-do’ Missouri spirit. Local government leaders, local businesses, and the entire community have come together, and stayed together. You put forth a vision, you were persistent in face of adversity, and today we celebrate a true success story – more than 60 years in the making,” said Bond.

Before the new levee project was completed, the area was protected only by an agricultural levee that stands two to 10 feet tall in different places. The new levee, along the North bank of the Missouri River, is about six miles long and nearly 25 feet tall in places – enough to withstand even the most severe floods, including the one in 1993.

For the community in Kansas City’s Northland the fear of a flood is very real. The entire 1,300 acres of developed and undeveloped land was flooded during the 1993 flood. That flood closed nearly 70 businesses, putting more than 5,000 people out of work for months.

The federal government authorized construction of the levee completed today back in 1944, but funding snags and planning delays blocked construction in the decades since. With the completed levee, projections indicate that development of the newly protected area could result in up to 11,000,000 square feet of industrial, retail and commercial space – potentially the largest Kansas City development project since the Kansas City International Airport.

“Now we can look to the future – instead of worrying about floodwaters, we can worry about too much traffic, and too-crowded businesses. Today we celebrate the end of construction and the start of true economic development. That means more business, more jobs, more people providing for their families close to home,” said Bond.