Fire Safety for a Downtown Kansas City Development

Conceived some five years ago, Cathedral Square is a handsome development on the west side of Kansas City, Mo.’s downtown. It brings together a premier office/commercial facility and a five-level, 1,400-car underground garage topped with a public plaza complete with extensive landscaping and five fountains—a place where people can work, conduct their personal business, shop and eat, keeping employees happy and employers loyal to the area. Cathedral Square Block 105 houses the headquarters of Kansas City Southern (KCS), a transportation company that encompasses one of the last important independent railways in the nation. KCS wanted its new headquarters to be modern, but to reflect its distinguished 19th century railway heritage. Cathedral Square’s fire protection was a negotiated design/build project with Siemens Building Technologies, Fire Safety Division, Florham Park, N.J. The alarm scenario In the nearly two years that Cathedral Square has been occupied, no false alarm has occurred.