The Messy City Podcast

One thing that’s really obvious when you talk with Johnny Youssef is that he’s just a very positive and happy guy. And, frankly, it’s amazing what he’s accomplished at a still-young age. Johnny started his journey in Egypt, and eventually landed in Kansas City as a small developer and rental property owner. We talk about how he focused on the not-sexy parts of our region, and quickly built an...

Kevin’s note: Apologies on the audio quality. Riverside did something funky to this episode, and I did my best to correct it.We all love to study success, and learn how to emulate it. Allan Branch likes to study failure. He studied it for his businesses, and for his city. Remarkably, it’s helped lead Allan to a lot of success in all his endeavors.Allan traces his roots from art school and family...

Nolan Gray is the author of the very successful book, “Arbitrary Lines: How Zoning Broke the American City and How to Fix It.” If you’re in the planning and zoning world, you’ve likely heard of it or read it. If you haven’t, run right out and do it.Most of this episode focuses on the unique nature of Houston, Texas, and its approach to land use regulation. Often-scorned by planners because the...

A developer colleague recently said to me, “I’ve only lived and worked in an era where cities are getting better. Now, I’m not so sure that’s the case anymore.” His comment along with a whole lot of other inputs got me to thinking - what if he’s right? Today, I consider a potentially dark path for big American cities. Are we in the midest of a new era of decline and retreat from urban areas? Will...

Mike Hathorne has been around the New Urbanism movement for over twenty years. That means he has that rare combination of idealism, practicality, and persistence. Nowadays, you can find Mike with Visionary Homes in Utah.While the principles of New Urbanism have guided his work for years, Mike has also been on the front lines trying to figure out how to get it all built. Like all of us, he’s had...

If you’re fortunate and diligent, you’ll encounter people in your field that are just supremely knowledgable about the details, and willing to talk about them. Audrey Navarro, the Managing Partner of Clemons Real Estate in Kansas City, is one of those people. I’ve found Audrey to be incredibly nice and pleasant to talk with, but also very ruthless (in a good way) with the numbers and the...

You’re not going to find too many movies with developers as the hero. For most of the public, their opinion of developers is somewhere below Congress. And that’s saying something.I find that all unfortunate, since developers are the ones who build virtually everything in our world - our homes, our offices, our shops, our entertainment. And there’s a group of developers who have been undertaking...

From Iain, whose excellent site you can find at this link:The term 'messy' is a growing one when it comes to cities just now, and it's a refreshing one in what has for the last little while been the domain of the planner, who tends to see the world from the top down. But what makes cities, and indeed a lot of companies, so good is that they embrace what comes from the bottom up.In cities that...

Usually when a Kansas Citian talks about Memphis, it’s to discuss their bbq vs ours. And trust me, they do make some good ribs on Memphis. But today we are here to learn about housing and redevelopment. The City of Memphis has taken some solid steps in recent years to reform all manner of codes and processes to enable more and better housing options. John Zeanah joins me to discuss the...

Jed Byrne is a man of many hats, but what he really cares about is demystifying real estate development for ordinary people. Jed’s podcast, Dirt NC, focuses primarily on issues in North Carolina and especially the Raleigh/Durham/Chapel Hill “Triangle” area. Earlier this year, Jed and a group of people from the local Chamber visited the Kansas City region on a mission to learn from each other. I’m...