Primary Election Recap Plus I-44 Construction Relief In Waynesville

We share Waynesville’s latest civic news, starting with the primary election results and a push to keep voter participation strong ahead of the November general election. Then we bring good news on I-44 construction, highlight a free Route 66 concert night, and show you a simple tool for sharing local events. 
• congratulating primary winners and thanking citizens for supporting initiatives 
• encouraging continued focus and turnout for the November general election 
• sharing MoDOT’s timeline to reopen I-44 lanes and improve traffic flow 
• asking residents to stay patient and courteous during detours through town 
• promoting the Cruising 66 Centennial Summer Concert Series at Roubidoux Park 
• inviting the community to post events, deals, and volunteer needs online for free sharing. Upload you event at theeventbucket.com/missouri. 

Transcript

Primary Election Results And Thanks

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Good morning, this is Sean Wilson, the mayor of Waynesville with your weekly update for August 2nd, 2026. Well this week the primary elections have taken place. We want to say congratulations to all of those who were selected to go on to the general election and we wish you um luck going forward. And also I want to thank everybody that came out to support the initiatives. Um the citizens really made their voices heard on the proposed propositions that was uh presented, and we want to encourage you to continue to um keep focus moving forward as we do have our general election coming up in November. So thank you for all of the citizens that participated and continue to spread the word about um casting your vote because it's very important that our citizens support and participate in the process.

I-44 Construction Timeline And MoDOT Plan

SPEAKER_00 0:51

I do want to share a little bit of good news to everyone who has been stuck in construction traffic in Waynesville on I-44, and it's been very difficult for us all. I do understand the frustration of from everybody, and exactly I sit in the same traffic and I experience the same frustration, and and my local business is also downtown, so getting back and forth is is very difficult, and uh I do know the the impact of the businesses in the the local downtown area and certainly do not want to see our businesses affected in a negative way. Um, but I do want to share a little bit of good news that I received from the con the regional engineer from Modot. He shared with me that the contractor is required to have both east and westbound lanes on interstate out of 44 open to traffic by noon on Sunday, August 9th. And as of the latest word, they may beat the deadline by a couple of days. So Modot is also actively working on um signal time um along Route 17 and the business loop to improve traffic flow through town that has been delayed um previously because there was during construction some lines that may have been um damaged when they upgraded to the crosswalk. So there's there's a lot of different um variables to why the changes have not happened as fast as we would like them to. Until we get through this rough patch of uh traffic, we just ask everyone to please continue to be patient and be courteous as the detour traffic comes through Waynesville. And uh thank you for hanging in there. Um, better roads are almost here, and most importantly, we'll be improving safety along the Route 66 corridor um as well as um I-44.

Free Route 66 Summer Concert Details

SPEAKER_00 2:43

Waynesville, we want you to mark your calendars for August 22nd at the Ruby Doo Park as the cruising 66 Centennial Summer Concert Series rolls on. Um, we're gonna have Bluegrass Favorite Lindley Creek headline in the night with Lauren Lurcher from 6:30 to 9 p.m. And admission is completely free. Bring your lawn chairs, bring your family, enjoy live music under the summer sky on historic route 66. This Think Local series presented by the Waynesville St. Robert Chamber of Commerce celebrates our town, supports hometown businesses, and brings neighbors together through the power of live entertainment. That's Saturday, August 22nd, 6 30 p.m. RubyDoo Park, and I hope to see you there. All

Share Local Events On Event Bucket

SPEAKER_00 3:39

right, Waynesville Citizens, I want to also share this with you the event bucket. I want you to go to all one word, the eventbucket.com forward slash Missouri. This is where you can upload your information for any event, yard sale, business deals, um, anything, anything that's going on with your local business. We want you to share it so we can share it in our waiting room at the at the city hall. We can share it on our broadcast. We have a broadcast station, and this is for us to keep track of everything that is going on in our city and make sure that your time and your resources are not wasted by helping you spread the word. So we encourage you to go there, theeventbucket.com forward slash Missouri, upload your event there, and we will broadcast it um free of charge for all citizens, yard sales, anything. If you need volunteers, if you got initiatives, you got classes going on, and you want to bring attention to them, please let's just fill up that event bucket so we can share all of the great things that are going on in our community. Um, it's just another outlet to encourage others to participate.

Final Sign-Off And Community Reminder

SPEAKER_00 4:50

That concludes this week's short update, and I look forward to seeing you on the mile.