"Edgy"

Troost Avenue has served as the understood dividing line between black Kansas City and white Kansas City for quite some time now. (I acknowledge that many suburbanites have mentally redrawn the line variously - at Main, at Ward Parkway, or even at the State Line - but this is my blog, and I'll choose to ignore them today.) I just noticed that a new restaurant has opened on the West side of Troost at Gregory (easy walking distance from my home) - "Grace, A Bistro On the Edge".

What?!?!

Exactly what "edge" are they talking about here? I looked at the menu (pdf) at the invaluable Pitch Menu Guide, and I don't think they're talking about the food, which appears to be standard bistro fare. I read the description of it in The Star's Cityscape column, and the hard-hitting, insightful journalists at the Star once again either dodged the racial aspect of the story or were utterly oblivious that the story even has a racial aspect.

Is "Grace, A Bistro On the Edge" a step toward openness and frank dialogue about the racial divisions in this segregated city? Is "Grace, A Bistro On the Edge" an obnoxious suggestion that the historically blurry boundary between Kansas City is actually a sharp edge, and that white diners can come to the "edge" and look out over the abyss they imagine the east side of Kansas City to be?