KANSAS CITY, Mo. — To a certain degree, the FIFA World Cup Qatar 2022 experience is so insular and singular that it doesn’t lend itself well to extrapolating what we can expect in Kansas City in 2026.
Consider the radical cultural differences there.
Such as women being treated as an oppressed double-minority and attempts to mute expressions of support for the LGBTQ community that is persecuted there. It’s also evident in the apathy over the hundreds of workers estimated to have died constructing stadiums and facilities and alcohol being prohibited in stadiums.
Not to mention photos routinely disappearing from the phones loaded with the “Hayya” app required for the entry of any international fans by, we are not making this up, the Supreme Committee for Delivery & Legacy.
Then there’s the sheer contrast in density between conducting a World Cup of 32 nations in eight stadiums within a 35-mile radius in a country approximately the size of Connecticut … and what in 2026 will be a 48-nation competition in 16 cities and three North American countries over a 13 million-plus square mile landscape.
Still, the transcendent soul of the World Cup (which concludes Sunday morning) that will readily translate to Kansas City was apparent everywhere — as three members of the KC2026 executive committee witnessed in Qatar and related in an interview with The Kansas City Star last week.
And for everything else the World Cup will mean to the city, perhaps nothing will be more memorable to us and our international visitors than how that is brought to life here.
Joe Reardon, the president and CEO of the Greater Kansas City Chamber of Commerce, particularly felt that before, during and after the U.S.-Iran match on Nov. 29.
Despite tensions between the nations, he was moved by the civil engagement between fans during the competition, the compassion of Team USA players consoling Iranians after a 1-0 victory by the U.S. and Iranian fans wanting to exchange scarves with his group after the game.
To say nothing of a chance meeting on the Doha Corniche, where the chamber’s David Pruente spoke with a 12-year-old Iranian who asked where in the states he was from.
Told Kansas City, the boy said, “Oh, the Chiefs. Patrick Mahomes.”
All of it, Reardon said, “was kind of magical.”
While he never had been to a World Cup, he had understood these sorts of experiences might be part of it. But now he says “there’s a depth to this that I didn’t fully realize.”
As she considered her most moving impressions of her first World Cup, deputy city manager Kimiko Gilmore thought about the animated meshing of people of all nationalities in about any random place from outside stadiums to the metro.
“There’s that energy that just carries you …” said Gilmore, who also is the executive director of convention and entertainment facilities for Kansas City. “Even right now, if you could feel my heart, every time I start talking about my experience it just lifts me in a way that I’ve never been lifted before in my life.”
Kansas City Sports Commission and Visit KC president Kathy Nelson, whose vital role in the bid process and preparations going forward can’t be overstated, was most struck by this telling detail at any given news conference: Translations were available in six different languages.
“That right there shows you the scope and the scale,” she said.
Through the variety of languages there and heard all over Doha, she added, one common denominator resonated.
“You could all smile,” she said, “because of a ball.”
Even previously having attended World Cups and Olympics, Nelson still was awed by the notion and what it implies.
“The world is right here in our hands,” she said. “And we’re not different. And we’re not that far apart.”
I’ve never had the privilege of covering the World Cup. But I’ve been to 10 Olympic games, and I treasure nothing more from those than the sense of the world coming together in the name of sport … and nearly always in the abiding spirit of sportsmanship in and out of competitions.
That undercurrent will be the foundation of it all no matter how much different it will look overlaid here.
Kansas City will hold a still-unclear number of games at GEHA Field at Arrowhead Stadium, conduct weeks of fan fests for tens of thousands (proposed sites are at Union Station and the south lawn of the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art) and surely serve as a base camp for one or more national team entourages and their fans.
(FIFA considers Kansas City a “base camp/training site Mecca,” said Nelson, noting Sporting KC’s Compass Mineral National Performance Center and Children’s Mercy Park and the Kansas City Current’s training facility and stadium under construction due to open in 2024).
We are the world, in other words, like never before.
Even before then, really, with a dramatic intermediate step when we host the 2023 NFL Draft.
Just weeks after the anticipated opening of the new airport in March, Hundreds of thousands are expected here April 27-29 for what the NFL has built into a mega-event.
“We’re preparing to host the largest event in our city’s history,” Nelson said. “And then three years later we’ll be hosting the largest event in the history of the world.”
Or as Reardon put it: “More people will come to know Kansas City in the next three or four years than ever before in the history of the city. Ever.”
That surge of international flavor, of course, makes for a remarkable opportunity for the region.
The estimated economic impact is in the hundreds of millions of dollars. Our name, image and brand will be transmitted around the globe to a cumulative audience of billions.
Unlike Qatar, which spent more than $220 billion on building for the World Cup, the only anticipated major facilities spending is on renovations to Arrowhead to conform to FIFA specifications.
Mayor Quinton Lucas has estimated that cost at $50 million, though it’s possible that price tag could go up or down depending on how FIFA’s stadium standards might evolve.
Now, the funding mechanism for that and other elaborate aspects of the operation, such as transportation and security, remain to be publicly clarified. And much remains to be worked out with FIFA in the runup. Moreover, economic impact studies can be tricky to track.
What is clear, though, is that this is an unprecedented chance for Kansas City to show off what and who it is.
The soccer world might already have a fine impression from televised images of the fever pitch for the sport at Power & Light and reflected in our remarkable viewership ratings.
But the hope is that those who stay or visit here will learn about everything from our friendly dispositions to BBQ to the Nelson-Atkins, everything from the National WWI Museum and Memorial to the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum and Harry S. Truman Presidential Library … and discover many of our other distinct businesses, restaurants and neighborhoods.
How it might all look is another story for another time … though Gilmore noted she hopes the skyline can be further illuminated the way Doha has been.
Of course, Doha had a $75 million budget for city decor, installed outdoor air conditioning through grates on the streets and built 49 miles of subway for the occasion.
The experience here simply won’t be as extravagant.
(Though Reardon made a great point when he noted an event like this provides an occasion to consider and develop concepts that can be carried forward such as better connectivity to the airport.)
But you can bet it will be authentically Kansas City, perhaps including such flourishes as multiple First Fridays and Boulevardia events to complement the fan fests.
As the smallest market among the 16 cities set to play host in 2026, Kansas City quite arguably has the most to gain in terms of exposure. People who have visited the United States before are likely to already know Los Angeles, Miami, New York and San Francisco.
In that context, Gilmore said, organizers have suggested Kansas City and the Midwest are exotic locales that can reinforce the fact that the United States is much more than just its coastal landmarks.
“We’re the city of intrigue,” Reardon said.
At least a city with an intriguing opportunity.
Not only to bring the world here, but also to help bring it together. Kind of magical, indeed.
