Honolulu’s electric rail is short of cash and answers on about power: Who will pay for a new substation? How will line relocations be handled and paid for? Who’s undergrounding the wires and paying for that? Not to mention, what will the train’s power bill be for decades to come? “When we hear all these challenges, it means one thing. Cha-ching,” said Panos Prevedouros, an engineering professor at the University of Hawaii.
... and the cost of a substation needed to power the rail operation center that HART didn’t budget for? “I suspect it’s something in the $150 million or more, since it was not planned part of the design,” Prevedouros said.
...HART has talked about the option of going independent, creating its own utility.
“This would have been a very smart idea to do from the get-go. Go independent, and then connect to the H-Power plant, which is not too far from where the rail line terminates,” Prevedouros said.
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