(Kansas City, Mo.) – Each day Kansas City’s water treatment plant pushes out an average 105 million gallons of clean, reliable drinking water to all of Kansas City and wholesale customers. As Kansas City keeps expanding north, so does the need for water.
In the early 1950s, Kansas City built a 36-inch water main to what would become Kansas City International Airport. Today, that pipeline is aging and stressed. To serve increasing residential and commercial Northland growth, KC Water is implementing the third phase of a four-phase project that adds a new water main to the Northland. The Arrowhead Transmission Main is an infrastructure upgrade critical for the future of the entire city.
“We are seeing potential increases in customers in residential and commercial customers in the Northland,” says Mike Klender, Manager of KC Water’s Water Treatment Plant. “We have to install the water mains now, prior to more development so that we’re ready to meet consumption.”
Phase 3 of the Arrowhead Transmission Main project will wind its way from North Oak Trafficway, north of Vivion Road, to NW Englewood Road near Highway 169 and then eventually run much farther north to the Arrowhead Pump Station.
KC Water is working with contractors to lessen the construction’s impact on customers. Instead of tearing up the intersection at NE 54th Street and N. Oak Trafficway, which would create a headache for motorists, a giant corkscrew is tunneling about 10 feet underground to push pipe into place.
Unfortunately, not everything can be done underground. Beginning in November a section of NE 54th Street will be under construction.
The completed water main is scheduled to be in service in April 2017.
With this project, KC Water is efficiently planning for the future.
“In the long run this project will lessen the stress on our pumps which then decreases the budget necessary to maintain the very critical equipment required to treat and pump water to the Northland,” says Klender.
For more information, please contact Brooke Givens, Media Relations Coordinator, at brooke.givens@kcmo.org or 816.513.0284.
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KC Water maintains and operates water treatment and distribution systems, stormwater management systems, and wastewater collection and treatment systems for residential and business customers in Kansas City and for wholesale customers in the Kansas City area. KC Water is primarily funded by fees charged to customers based on their use or impacts on the three utility systems.
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