KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Some people living downtown Kansas City, Missouri, have been dealing with water outages due to recent water main breaks in the area.
“Yeah, we’ve been without water since 8 a.m,” said Christy Keeling, who lives in downtown KCMO.
Keeling lives near Broadway Boulevard and west 7th Street.
“We’ve been purchasing gallons of water, because at this point, it is a preventative thing,” Keeling said. “Living here, it’s been going on for two years. We know we will have these water outages that we manage through."
On Wednesday, Keeling called 311 to report the broken main and water bubbling down west 7th Street.
“Luckily, they found it pretty quickly, because it broke in the same spot as last week,” she said.
KSHB 41 News first reported on a break on the same street last week and interviewed Keeling the next day.
“This is the third time in three days that my water was turned off — I’m a downtown resident,” Keeling said at the time.
On Wednesday, Keeling expressed frustration with the lingering issue.
“It’s been four separate days," she said. "Wednesday, it was scheduled maintenance. Thursday, a water main break. Friday, a different downtown water main break and today it broke again.”
Last week, KCMO Mayor Quinton Lucas talked about the challenges of historic infrastructure.
“We know there are infrastructure challenges in a major city," Lucas said last week. “We hate to see them, but we will try to address this concern, but also make sure we don’t have other issues in the future.”
Keeling said she's hoping the main will be replaced soon.
“I’m not looking for Mayor Q to call me up and apologize for not having water,” Keeling said. “I just want them to replace this main so we can have water to be consistent.”
Keeling said she wants a meaningful repair or full replacement.
“I can’t say a disaster won’t happen in the future,” Lucas said. “I can say we will try to make sure to prevent them by inspecting your lines regularly and improving our infrastructure every day.”
KSHB 41 News asked the City of KCMO and KC Water for more information on Wednesday. This story will be updated if a response is received.
—
