59th Street near Union City shut down, floodwaters take out train car culvert

A stretch of 59th Street between Highway 81 and Alfadale Road is closed after fast-moving floodwaters caused damage under a repurposed rail car culvert, Canadian County District 2 Commissioner Lacey Dawson confirmed this afternoon.
“The actual problem, it looks like some water went under a rail car pipe,” Dawson said. “So there’s really not a lot we can do until the water goes down, because the water is running so fast right now.”
Though the road is completely closed in that mile, Dawson said local homes are unaffected.
“All of the homes on that mile, thankfully, are on the east side of the issue. So they all have access to 81,” she said. “There’s no need for any traffic at all from where the problem occurs to Highway 81 on 59th.”
With other area roads closed, Highway 152 for the ODOT project, and 29th for an OEMA project, residents can detour just one mile north.
“44th Street, which is one mile north of 59th, it is open ,” Dawson said. “So, if you’re coming up Alfadale, rather than going down 59th, if you’ll just go up one more mile to 44th, then you’ll have access right through.”
Dawson and her crew are closely monitoring 44th, which is gravel and vulnerable to washouts.
“It is passable. I know this morning when the rain was coming down real heavy, there was a report of water on the roadway. So we just made sure that it was still safe to cross,” she said.
As for the damaged culvert on 59th, Dawson said, “It’s a rail car, and it’s just west of where the bridge is a little ways, but it carries quite a bit of water.”
She noted the road had worsened since her first visit.
“The road has buckled a lot more than it was this morning,” Dawson said. “We’ve 100% got the road blocked off at 81 because there’s no homes right there. You technically can get up to the bridge on the east side of it from the other direction, but we’re really trying to discourage anybody from being out on there because we don’t want it to collapse on someone.”
Dawson said the District 2 team responded quickly and effectively to the issue.
“My road crew is phenomenal,” she said. “Steve Allen is my road foreman, and he has been on it hot since before 6 a.m. David Jones with the Town of Union City is amazing and he has been communicating really well with us.”
“This is my first kind of flooding event as a commissioner, and so it’s a little bit of a learning curve, but between all of us, we’re just keeping eyes on everything as much as we can.”

For reliable information about the washout and any other Union City transportation/safety information, check with the “Union City Oklahoma Police Department” and “Union City Oklahoma Fire Department” Facebook pages.