View source for Southwest Boulevard (Kansas City)

{{distinguish|Southwest Trafficway}}
[[File:Royal Liquors Southwest Blvd Kansas City.jpg|thumb|300px|right|A road sign along Southwest Boulevard at intersection with Summit Street.]]

'''Southwest Boulevard''' (simply known as "The Boulevard" locally<ref name=":0">{{Cite web|last=Salazar|first=Monique|date=2 June 2015|title=The Boulevard|url=http://www.squeezeboxcity.com/the-boulevard/|archive-url=|archive-date=|access-date=13 January 2021|website=SqueezeBoxCity|language=en-US}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|last=Travis|first=Cheryl|date=23 August 2018|title=Southwest Boulevard, Kansas City Missouri|url=http://kcmogo.com/southwest-blvd-kansas-city.php|archive-url=|archive-date=|access-date=13 January 2021|website=kcmogo.com}}</ref>) is an arterial street in [[Kansas City, MO]] and [[Kansas City, KS]].

==Description==
On the north end Southwest Boulevard starts as 19th Street at Baltimore Avenue in Kansas City, MO, and travels southwest crossing the state line into Kansas City, KS at 31st Street and continues until crossing 39th Avenue at which point it continues as Merriam Lane. Southwest Boulevard passes through the [[Crossroads Arts District]] and the [[West Side, Kansas City|West Side Neighborhood]] in [[Missouri]] and also the [[Rosedale, Kansas|Rosedale Neighborhood]] in [[Kansas]]. Throughout the Kansas City area, the Boulevard is known for its wide selection of authentic Mexican restaurants and grocery stores.<ref>{{citation |title=Missouri Off the Beaten Path |page=112 |author=Patti DeLano |year=2008 |isbn=9780762748747}}</ref><ref>{{citation |title=Insiders' Guide to Kansas City |author=Katie Van Luchene |year=2010 |isbn=9780762753437 |page=64}}</ref> It is the home of the [[Boulevard Brewing Company]] which was founded in 1989 and is now one of the largest craft breweries in the USA, with a capacity of over 600,000 barrels per year.<ref>{{citation |title=The Oxford Companion to Beer |publisher=[[Oxford University Press]] |year=2011 |isbn=9780195367133 |page=155 |author=Keith Villa}}</ref>

==History==
Southwest Boulevard originated as two roads, one being the main street of Rosedale, Kansas, when it was platted in 1872 as "Kansas City Avenue", and the second called "The Rosedale Road", or "Kansas City Boulevard", on the Missouri side.<ref name="histr">[http://rosedale.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/9-27-sw_merriamcorridor_masterplan_final.pdf Southwest Boulevard - Merriam Lane Corridor Master Plan] (2010)</ref> Two property owners provided land to link the two roads in 1887, and the entire road was later renamed as "Southwest Boulevard."<ref name="histr"/><ref name="hist2">Landis, Margaret. [http://www.kckpl.lib.ks.us/documents/rosedale_chapter10.pdf A History of the City of Rosedale], Ch. 10 - "Southwest Boulevard" (1976)</ref><ref name="1910-one">[https://books.google.com/books?id=oS8yAQAAMAAJ&q=%22southwest+boulevard%22&pg=PA160 Heeded Plaint of Motorists:  Rutty Southwest Boulevard is to be made permanently smooth], ''The City Hall'' (October 1910, p. 160)</ref> One of those landowners was Simeon Bell, who later donated the land upon which Eleanor Taylor Bell Hospital was built on Southwest Boulevard, and which housed the [[University of Kansas Hospital|University of Kansas medical school]] until the 1920s. The Rosedale-Kansas portion of the road was originally [[macadam]]ized, and was paved in 1915.<ref name="hist2"/>

The Boulevard twice faced devastation during the 1950s, first by water during the [[Great Flood of 1951]], and then by fire, in 1959, when an oil tanker explosion killed six people and caused widespread property damage.<ref name=":0" /><ref>{{Cite web|last=Burke|first=Robert|date=30 November 2009|title=The Southwest Boulevard Fire: Kansas City Remembers a Tragedy|url=https://www.firehouse.com/home/article/10470698/tuesday-aug-18-1959-started-out-like-many-other-summer-days-in-the-kansas-city-metropolitan-area-sunny-with-temperatures-in-the-90s-and-a-south-wind-of-13-mph-before-the-day-would-end-five-kansas-city-mo-firefighters-and-one-civilian-would-die-in|archive-url=|archive-date=|access-date=13 January 2021|website=Firehouse.com}}</ref>

Part of the road used to be signed as [[US-69 (KS)#Part Oklahoma-Part Kansas|U.S. 69]]<ref name="route691">[https://books.google.com/books?id=prI_kG_QmvoC&dq=%22southwest+boulevard%22&pg=PA500 Kansas, a Guide to the Sunflower State], p. 500 (1939)</ref> until the [[18th Street Expressway]] was completed in the 1950s.

==Major intersections==
{{jcttop|state_col=State}}
{{KSint
|sspan=4
|county=Wyandotte
|cspan=4
|location=Kansas City
|lspan=4
|mile=0.000
|road=10th Street / McDowell Lane
|notes=Western terminus
}}
{{KSint
|mile=
|road=Mission Road
|notes=Interchange
}}
{{KSint
|road={{jct|state=KS|I|35}}
|notes=I-35 exit 233
}}
{{KSint
|mile=
|road={{jct|state=KS|US|169}}
}}
{{MOint
|sspan=4
|county=Jackson
|cspan=4
|location=Kansas City
|lspan=4
|mile=
|road=22nd Street / Avenida Cesar E Chavez to Kansas Avenue to {{Jct|state=KS|K|32|dir1=west}}
|notes=22nd Street Concurrency overlap
}}
{{MOint
|mile=
|road={{jct|state=MO|to1=To|I|35|dir1=south|road|W. Pennway}}
|notes=I-35 exit 1C
}}
{{MOint
|mile=
|road=20th Street to McGee Street / McGee Street to 22nd Street
|notes=22nd Street Concurrency overlap
}}
{{MOint
|mile=
|road=Baltimore Avenue / 19th Street
|notes=Eastern terminus; road continues as 19th St.
}}
{{jctbtm|col=7}}

==See also==
{{Portal|United States}}
* [[39th Street (Kansas City)]]
* [[Linwood Boulevard (Kansas City)]]
* [[Prospect Avenue (Kansas City, Missouri)]]
* [[The Paseo (Kansas City)]]

==References==
{{reflist}}

==External links==
* [http://kchistory.org/cdm4/results.php?CISOOP1=exact&CISOFIELD1=CISOSEARCHALL&CISOROOT=all&CISOBOX1=Southwest+Boulevard Southwest Boulevard Photographs], Missouri Valley Special Collections, Kansas City Public Library

{{coord|39|5|17.29|N|94|35|18.33|W|region:US|display=title}}

[[Category:Streets in Kansas City, Missouri]]
[[Category:Boulevards in the United States]]