Around 8:30 am Wednesday morning, flames engulfed the second floor of the historic Pickwick building in downtown Kansas City. The building is undergoing a $65 million renovation by Gold Crown Properties, who hopes to turn the property into 260 market-rate apartments atop 30,000 square feet of retail space.
Developers say the fire was contained to the second floor of the bus terminal in a room with concrete floors, brick walls, and concrete ceilings.
“The only items burning were HVAC equipment that was wrapped in foam and cardboard,” the developer said in a statement. “This wrapping was the primary cause for the extreme amounts of smoke, giving the appearance that the fire was more severe.”
Gold Crown Properties says it is still working with investigators to determine the actual cause of the fire, but in the meantime, there is no setback in the timeline of the project’s delivery.
“This fire will not cause any delay in the opening of the project as the only damage was to staged construction material and smoke damage,” the statement continues.
Crews are back on site today and the project remains on schedule.
Read more on the historic Pickwick conversion project here.