The Kansas City shooting destroyed the fabric of the city. Did it also end sports championship parades as we know them?

KANSAS CITY — As Chris Jones led the crowd in a three-pointer, Chiefs fans had fun imagining what could happen in February 2025. After Jones (perhaps drunkenly) said he would be back for the 2024 season, one could be forgiven for being an exuberant Chiefs fan dreaming of a third straight Super Bowl parade and fourth in six seasons.

Just like in 2020 and 2023, Wednesday's parade culminated along Grand Street with a rally in front of Union Station. But minutes after Travis Kelce serenaded the audience with an unconventional version of “Friends in Low Places,” chaos ensued. One person, Lisa Lopez, was killed and over 20 people were shot in another mass shooting in America.

Now Kansas City mourns Lopez and the wounded. As police search for a motive for the shooting after arresting three people, the city will soon have to grapple with another question: Will there ever be a championship parade like this again?

The area in front of the historic train station has become the site of all of Kansas City's large gatherings. The Royals celebrated their 2015 World Series title there, and the 2023 NFL Draft took place at the exact spot where the Chiefs celebrated their recent Super Bowl victories.

All four championship saves followed the same path; Players, coaches, staff and dignitaries will be carried south on the Grand through downtown before disembarking and celebrating in front of thousands of people in front of the Liberty Memorial.

On the Monday and Tuesday after the Super Bowl, the theme in the city I love was how good we've become at putting on parades. A car strayed into the route before the parade began in 2020, leading to a brief chase, but the four parades since 2015 have largely passed without major incident.

Until now. More than 800 police officers from Kansas City and surrounding areas were present Wednesday. The presence of all those good men and women with a gun did not prevent this.

On Wednesday, more than 20 people were shot and one person was killed at the end of the Kansas City Chiefs' Super Bowl parade. (` Photo/Charlie Riedel)

By all accounts, first responders' response to the shooting was quick. The shooting victims received help within seconds and many were at area hospitals within minutes. And while their actions should have been warmly commended, they also shouldn't have been necessary.

“I'm sorry. I’m sorry this happened yesterday,” Kansas City Mayor Quinton Lucas told KCTV. “I and we worked hard to put together an exceptional parade. We spent millions on it.

Wednesday's shooting is not the first to occur near a North American championship parade in recent years. In 2019, four people were injured in a shooting during the Toronto Raptors' title celebration.

But it's no secret that gun violence is a much bigger problem in the United States than in Canada and other countries. Kansas City is not immune to these problems either. The rate of gun violence is one of the highest in the country among major cities.

However, these statistics do not explain what happened on Wednesday. And that's why the question Kansas City will soon face about future parade routes is also being addressed in cities across the country. Did what happened Wednesday in Kansas City end the championship parade as we know it?

If you think this is a hyperbolic question, think about it for a moment. No matter the size of the police presence, there is no reasonable way to secure the entire parade route or the outdoor venue where Wednesday's shooting occurred, such as a sporting event or concert. And in Missouri (and many other states), open and concealed carry of firearms is legal in many circumstances. There was no mention of firearms in the Sports Authority's list of parade rules.

The success of local sports teams is one of the few remaining things that can bind a city's residents together. The championship parade is the ultimate example. Instead of buying an expensive ticket to watch your favorite athlete play, everyone can grab a front-row seat and catch a glimpse of the parade route, as long as you get there early enough.

But now it's all too easy to imagine citywide championship celebrations becoming an exclusive affair in the name of safety. Without the ability to adequately ensure gun-free zones along a parade route, teams could choose to host celebrations in their own arenas or stadiums instead of a parade. Capacity would be extremely limited compared to a citywide celebration, and to get in, fans would have to go through security, like on game days.

It's a solution that benefits no one except the lucky few who could participate.

As I stood with my father at the front of the parade route hours before the shooting, we talked about how we wanted to be in every parade. The Chiefs have now won four Super Bowls. Wednesday marked his fourth Super Bowl parade. It was my third. We vowed that if we were lucky enough to attend again, be it next year or any year after that, we would not choose to be home. And we both hoped that what we were watching wouldn't be the last time we saw it together.

Little did we know that it might have been our last parade. And all for reasons that have nothing to do with the Chiefs' future success on the field.