Honolulu Pavements ala Mufi

Hannemann just dropped his latest propaganda piece. In it he claims that while in office he:

- Filled more than 244,323 potholes
- Resurfaced 566 lane miles
- Spent $124 million on road rehabilitation

My take on these "accomplishments" is as follows:

(1) That's nearly a quarter million ways of patching pavements the wrong way and at a huge labor and material cost. And with a poor visual, safety and ride-quality result.

(2) This includes fixes on 2, 4 and 6 lanes roads. Using a 4-lane road as an average and three years in the office, yields a tiny resurfacing record of 47 road miles per year. The city will never catch up with its $1.8 billion pavement repair backlog. Worse yet, most of the lane miles claimed are likely to be long patches and superficial half inch jobs which begin to deteriorate immediately and last but a few years. (A properly rehabilitated or resurfaced road will last a minimum of 10 and up to 25 years.)

(3) Only in the 2009 budget Hannemann allocated $77 million on rehabilitation and that's too low. Having spent $124 M in three years shows that he does not have a clue when it comes to priorities. And given his traditional thuthiness with the facts, this item may also include the cost of doing the potholes and resurfacing!