Even though you have Jayhawk in your name, I'll go ahead and answer! Joking, of course. I do commute out of MCI to ORD. I have found it to be O.K. as I have been doing it for a few years now. The loads vary and I don't even check them and there a a few of us that commute up to ORD. However, I usually can get a seat with the aggreements put in place (open jumpseating). It hasn't been a problem as of yet.

My backup plan is SWA to Midway. As I have yet to try it the plan would be to get there then take the train to the "hub" of that system and take the connection that drops you directly in ORD. People have told me about it and it cost a mere couple of bucks and will take about an hour and a half to two hours they told me. It's a matter of taking I think the blue line to the hub then the orange line to ORD. So it shouldn't be that big of a deal.

www.flightlookup.com is the website that I use. I punch in the days and time for travel and it will give me all of the flights.