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Fans attending Tuesday's FIFA World Cup match in Kansas City faced significant transportation challenges, including bus delays, GPS navigation errors, and long walks to the stadium.
Jose Santa-Maria drove from Topeka to Lawrence, where he took a shuttle to the FIFA Fan Festival.
He said the regional connector had no issues, and he boarded his 5 p.m. pickup bus by 4:45 p.m.
But the ride to Kansas City Stadium (GEHA Field at Arrowhead Stadium) did not go as planned.
"All of a sudden I see that we passed the I-70 East exit, and I'm like ‘Hmm, I wonder if they have a different route,'" Santa-Maria said.
Santa-Maria said the bus headed north into a one-way construction zone and encountered rush-hour traffic.
He said there was also a language barrier with Spanish-speaking fans on board.
When passengers tried to get answers from the driver, they were met with silence.
“[They’d ask] ‘Hey, what's going on?' And he wouldn't say anything," Santa-Maria said.
Santa-Maria said the driver mentioned a GPS issue, and passengers watched as other buses passed them heading in the opposite direction.
"All these buses are passing us on the left side, and he's just sticking to the right, and of course, the people are getting angry," Santa-Maria said. "Tempers were getting high. People were getting real mad.”
He said the bus left Fan Fest at 4:50 p.m. and did not drop passengers off until 7 p.m. — more than two hours later.
Santa-Maria said he walked an additional 40 minutes and just barely made it to the opening ceremony on time.
"I really wanted to experience the whole thing, right,” Santa-Maria said. “So it was stressful, it was frustrating. It was definitely frustrating.”
Despite the ordeal, Santa-Maria said the night was still a success overall.
"It was a great night overall besides that point," Santa-Maria said.
Santa-Maria, who was rooting for Algeria and said Tuesday's match was the only one he had tickets for, said he would still like to return to Fan Fest.
He also had pointed criticism for the organizers.
"I think Missouri kind of dropped the ball on that, on the logistics of it,” Santa-Maria said. “But it is what it is. It's fun.”
He says that when he tried to submit feedback on the KC2026 website, he was met with an error message.
KSHB 41 reached out to KC2026 for a comment on this issue but has not yet heard back.
KC2026 did, however, cite stadium entry as the cause for transportation delays getting to Tuesday's match.
"Maybe fix your reporting tools, but also make sure that your drivers know exactly how to get there, maybe have a backup plan," Santa-Maria said.
Some fans chose to bypass the bus system entirely, walking to the stadium on their own after growing tired of waiting.
"They said they don't have an answer over there, so we can't just wait," one fan said.
Stacy Winkler also attended Tuesday's match.
She boarded her bus at Oak Park Mall, arrived at 4:30 p.m. for a 5 p.m. reservation, and was on the bus by 4:45 p.m.
Her bus arrived at the stadium parking lot at 6:15 p.m., but it was 7 p.m. by the time she made it inside to the Fan Fest checkpoint.
She says the return trip to Oak Park Mall took about 30 minutes.
Winkler said the walk from the bus drop-off point to the stadium was longer and more complicated than she expected.
"When I originally got off the bus, I was like, 'You've got to be kidding me, I have to walk that far,'" Winkler said. "It was far, like really far. The tunnel that people usually go through was closed, and so they had us winding around this pathway to get there.”
Despite the challenges, Winkler said the experience was ultimately worth it and that she too would do it again.
"When you just took in the atmosphere, you took in the kindness of people, it sort of outweighed that," Winkler said. "I feel like they really did the best that they possibly could for our city," Winkler said.
This story was reported on-air by a journalist and has been converted to this platform with the assistance of AI. Our editorial team verifies all reporting on all platforms for fairness and accuracy.
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