Milwaukee streetcar crew causes AT&T outage
Crews working on the Milwaukee Streetcar project have caused an AT&T outage.
The AT&T line was damaged Monday, cutting off service to more than 100 customers. Dozens were still without service as of Wednesday afternoon.
The incident reportedly occurred near the corner of N. Broadway and W. Wells Street in downtown Milwaukee.
"Some of our facilities were damaged by a crew doing construction in the Milwaukee area," said Samara Sodos, a spokeswoman for AT&T Wisconsin. "Services are starting to restore now and we will continue to work until all customers are restored. We apologize for the inconvenience."
Track for the Milwaukee streetcar is being installed on W. St. Paul Ave. and N. Broadway by contractors with Kiewit Corp.
"As with any public works project, the contractors we hire perform due diligence in identifying locations of utilities within the construction zone," said Ghassan Korban, commissioner of the Department of Public Works. "Unfortunately, despite the best precautions, an underground telecommunication utility was accidentally damaged."
Korban added that workers were trying to repair the line as quickly as possible.
A number of businesses, including Pizza Shuttle on N. Farwell Ave., were affected.