Water main break floods Manayunk streets; residents, business owners say its an all-too-common occurrence

PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — A water main break in Manayunk shut down the neighborhood’s Main Street Friday afternoon.

Water began flooding all of Carson Street and parts of Cresson and Main streets a little before 2 p.m.

Talula and Taylor moved onto Cresson Street two weeks ago, just down from where the main broke.

“The sidewalk buckled and it was shooting right out of there, and then all of this was flooded,” Taylor said.

They said their water shut off at 3 p.m. Crews had pumped out the standing water and were cleaning up the muddy scene on Cresson about an hour later.

Philadelphia Water Department hasn’t given a reason for the break, but Mark Dundon, owner of Dara’s Mediterranean on Cresson, said it’s a result of long-overdue water pipe replacements in the neighborhood.

“A couple years ago, they started a block and a half away, caused some problems under the ground — water main breaks, leaks into people’s basements,” Dundon said. “They had to redo it again; now they’re down in this section and it looks like it caused another re-break. … It’s probably the result of water lines they should’ve replaced years ago.”

Dundon said he was lucky this time because Dara’s is on the side of Cresson that uses another water main, but that hasn’t always been the case.

“Your life comes to a halt for days… and some floods, weeks. And some businesses lower down in the flood plain, can be months.”