On a rainy day in the Armourdale neighborhood of Kansas City, Kansas, Joe Bichelmeyer, co-owner of Bichelmeyer Meats at 704 Cheyenne Ave., takes a break and steps outside under a red awning to get some fresh air. This rain reminds him of the relentless weather that caused the devastating 1951 flood that submerged his family’s shop. He was just one year old but heard the story many times in graphic detail from his father.
“The Kansas River flooded its banks after large rain to the west,” Bichelmeyer says. “So, the water coming down the Kaw River had no place to go but to back up over the levees.”
Catastrophic floods across Wyandotte County have, for years, caused millions of dollars in property and infrastructure damage, as well as loss of life. Now, the Unified Government of Wyandotte County and Kansas City, Kansas, is partnering with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to raise and improve the levee. But residents and experts point to clogged, century-old underground infrastructure as another cause of regular floods.
The 1951 flood caused $800 million in damages 28 individuals lost their lives. There was massive rebuilding in Argentine, Armourdale and the West Bottoms.
Shelly Eickhoff's family operated several businesses in the area in the 1950s. Thirty years later, they bought an 1895 hardware store. All the way up on the second floor, there is a marker representing the high-water marker from 1951.
“When my dad bought the building, he refused to let us paint it," Eickhoff says. "But that gave us the actual flood marks of how high the water was."
But both Eickhoff and Bichelmeyer experienced the 1993 floods, called one of the most damaging floods in modern times, according to the National Weather Service. Hundreds of homes were almost under water. Thousands of acres of farmland inundated by the overflowing rivers. Coffins and headstones were unearthed from a graveyard and found miles away.
“My family had lost entirely everything,” says Eickhoff. "My grandfather on my mother's side, his house went through the flood down here in Armourdale, and it took about six months until they got their house rebuilt."
Eickhoff takes some time to catch her breath, to wipe away tears, as she remembers how the family quickly removed inventory from store shelves. She said it was an emotional roller coaster.
“It took us 17 hours, and probably 40 people showed up and helped us take everything out of here,” she says. “People, we don't even know who they were. We stayed open. We gave everybody anything they needed to help get their stuff out. My dad didn't charge them anything.”
It took four months for the hardware store to reopen.
Bichelmeyer's shop was spared water damage, but his trust in flood prevention efforts faded away.
“It was a cause of major concern,” he says. “You would like to feel like you have a comfort zone, that your business will continue to be there and not be bothered by flood waters or any kind of disruption that water might create.”
Flood mitigation techniques
In 2021, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, along with the Unified Government of Wyandotte County and Kansas City, Kansas, began the Kansas City Levee Project. It adds upgrades to the current 17-mile levee system along the Kansas and Missouri Rivers. The project costs $529 million and will add five feet to the top of the levee. Earthen infill of compacted soil will enhance the embankments. Along the outskirts of the levee, the Army Corps is digging 120 relief wells, designed to ease water pressure.
Heavy machinery, including monster cranes and drills, bring a deafening roar to a chilly March morning as the Army Corps digs out the last three relief wells under the Central Avenue Bridge. The area is thick with mud from yesterday’s rain. Project Manager with the Army Corp Craig Weltig says they’ve been making piecemeal improvements on the levee since the 1993 floods.
"With the studies that have occurred, it shows storms are more frequent or have become more intense,” he says. "That shows that we have to do something to add additional resiliency to the levee.”
There are three so-called levee units in Kansas City, Kansas, divided according to the communities behind them, including some 30,000 in the Armoudale and Argentine areas. Much of the $10 billion infrastructure is part of the industry in the Central Industrial District. Weltig says the work done in the first three years of the project protected much of Wyandotte County in 2024, when other parts of the metro experienced excessive water.
“We were just starting to activate and close gates up and down the river,” says Wetlig. “The water never really got up to load the levee; everything was in place and worked.”
But 2025 was different. In one 12-hour deluge in July, there was an accumulation of up to 10 inches of rain, causing creeks and rivers to gush over their banks and highways to close. Basements flooded and cars were submerged under water.
Damages soared over $1million. But Weltig says the cause of flooding in Wyandotte County was not because water breached the levee.
“The one from 2025 was like an interior event where, you know, some areas got like nine inches of rain at a time. It wasn't from (a levee breach.)"
What Weltig and others discovered was that the county’s deteriorating combined sewer and stormwater system caused rising water to spill out of storm drains and sewer pipes flooding streets, yards and businesses.
Water From Within
For years, residents and business owners have complained that storm drains overflow even in smaller severe weather events.
Shelly Eickhoff with the family hardware store has long been pointing out the impact of the deteriorating underground infrastructure. “I think that problem (of underground infrastructure) is still being kind of ignored,” she says.
Joe Bichelmeyer remembers being caught by surprise that day in July.
“I actually saw a storm drain cap go up into the air like a geyser of water," he says. “It was something certainly unique to see in this area.”
Jeff Miles, the Unified Government’s director of environmental services, knows all about the aging sewer and stormwater system. The older combined systems of sewer and stormwater drains are made of metal, wood, and clay. Some are over 100 years old and simply can’t contain a rush of excess water.
“It overflows (into) and the other pipes," Miles says. “So sometimes in situations where you have a high-water event, high rain event, and the storm lines are completely full, it runs into the river as fast as it can.”
The 2025 event cost the city nearly $1.5 million in infrastructure repairs but the total cost to residents' personal property is unknown. To prevent increased flooding from the underground systems, the Unified Government has entered a consent decree with the Department of Justice and the Environmental Protection Agency. The plan is to replace the combined systems over a 25-year period. The cost: $900 million.
But Miles says residents are contributing to the problem.
“In certain neighborhoods, I thought, there was more water than we've seen in the past.," Miles says. "And when we went in there, we found mulch, we found things from people's yards, trash, debris, plugging things up.”
The water, Miles says, couldn’t go anywhere.
The Unified Government is addressing the problem in multiple ways. The first involves a fleet of four trucks equipped with a powerful vacuum and a high-pressure water hose. Before every forecast of heavy rainfall, the trucks go out to clean storm drains so water will flow through. The government has also introduced a new trash cart system. Instead of putting trash bags on the curb where they are easily washed down drains, residents now have special bins that waste management workers come around and collect.
Back at Bichelmeyer's shop, the rain is falling harder now. As he prepared to back inside to work, he says he hopes the flood mitigation efforts will keep his business humming for another 80 years. Not just for himself, but also for the people around him.
“Any pre-planning and work that can be done to prevent those situations is a plus for the business community and the residential community still in these areas that have been flooded many times," he says.
The Kansas City Levee Project is scheduled to be completed by fall of 2026.
