The fair place to meet is Chicago, IL — the city closest to the midpoint of Buffalo and Kansas City. From the farther side that’s about 9 hr 28 min of driving.
Recommended midpoint
Chicago, IL
From Buffalo
9 hr 28 min
452 mi to Chicago
From Kansas City
8 hr 39 min
412 mi to Chicago
Kansas City has the shorter trip; the split is off by about 49 min. The alternatives below can even it out. Buffalo and Kansas City are about 858 miles apart.
Buffalo and Kansas City are about 858 miles apart by road. Split the difference and you arrive near Chicago, the city closest to the halfway point between them. That puts roughly 9 hr 28 min of driving on the Buffalo side and 8 hr 39 min on the Kansas City side — the fairest single meeting point among the cities near the middle.
Over this distance most people will fly rather than drive the whole way. Chicago still makes a fair, central place for Buffalo and Kansas City to converge, splitting the travel instead of asking one side to cross the country.
If Chicago doesn't have what you're after, Indianapolis and Milwaukee are also close to the midpoint and worth a look — each keeps the drive reasonably balanced between Buffalo and Kansas City.
Chicago is the most populous city in the U.S. state of Illinois and in the Midwestern United States. Located on the western shore of Lake Michigan, it is the third-most populous city in the United States, with a population of 2.74 million at the 2020 census. Read more →
Buffalo is a city in the U.S. state of New York. It lies in Western New York on the eastern shore of Lake Erie and at the head of the Niagara River on the Canada–United States border. Read more →
Kansas City, abbreviated KC or KCMO, is the largest city in the U.S. state of Missouri by both population and area. It is located on the Missouri River at its confluence with the Kansas River, within Jackson, Clay, Platte and Cass counties. Read more →
City descriptions adapted from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA); photos via Wikimedia Commons, credited above.
Estimates use straight-line distance and typical road speeds; real drive times vary with route and traffic.